CORPORATE SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY
ENVIRONMENT
Click here for the ISO 14001 certification for our facility in Gaffney, North Carolina
Click here for the ISO 14001 certification for our Premier Farnell UK Ltd and European facilities
We continually seek to reduce the environmental impacts and the associated costs of our operations worldwide.
Our principal environmental impacts are
- GHG emissions
- The use of paper and packaging
- The disposal of waste
We set annual targets for the reduction of these impacts and publicly report our performance online and in the Annual Financial Report & Accounts.
We are proud to be member’s of the Prince’s May Day Network – demonstrating our commitment to the environment, and recognising our effect on climate change.
We collect data on the amount of energy used and greenhouse gas emitted, waste disposed and waste recycled by Group operations in order to assess our environmental impact.
We derive our carbon footprint from our annual energy bills, using DEFRA, the US DoE and the World Resource Institute’s GHG protocol emissions factors for our countries of operation. Where our operations are particularly small, or it is not practical to obtain energy bills, we estimate carbon emissions for facilities, based on a calculation of headcount.
We collect data on waste disposed to landfill and waste recycled from our waste disposal suppliers directly.
In order to ensure that we have representative and reliable environmental data, we review new data each quarter and compare it to data from prior years. This continual review and comparison allows us to detect and correct any errors and may result in the restatement of certain prior year figures.
The figures published in our annual CSR report are assured by SGS UK Ltd for their accuracy.
Register of Environmental Aspects & Impacts Environmental Aspects & Impacts – Review, Measurement & ReportingThe Group continually seeks to reduce the environmental impact of its operations. In 2007, we defined our carbon footprint as those primary activities over which we have direct control - Premier Farnell’s carbon footprint therefore includes all of our activities from the receipt of products into our warehouses to their despatch to customers, including the production of catalogues and marketing material, our use and the disposal of packaging and the energy required to operate our facilities.
| Total amount used | Unit rate | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| (000) | Total used/£1,000 of sales | |||||
| 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | |
| Electricity (kwh) | 30,732 | 32,201 | 31,596 | 39 | 40 | 44 |
| Natural gas (cubic metres) | 1,357 | 1,472 | 1,313 | 1.7 | 1.8 | 1.9 |
| Propane (kilogrammes) | 6 | 5 | 5 | 0.01 | 0.01 | 0.01 |
| Fuel oil (litres) | 102 | 75 | 97 | 0.1 | 0.1 | 0.1 |
| Petrol for company cars/trucks (litres)* | 299 | 312 | 310 | 0.4 | 0.4 | 0.4 |
| Diesel (litres) | 338 | 398 | 341 | 0.4 | 0.5 | 0.5 |
| Petrol for rented cars/trucks (litres)* | 434 | 506 | 644 | 0.5 | 0.6 | 0.9 |
| Metric tonnes CO2 emitted | Metric tonnes CO2/£1,000 of sales | |||||
| 24,768 | 26,040 | 25,426 | 0.031 | 0.32 | 0.035 | |
Business Travel | ||||
| Short Haul Air | Long Haul Air | Rail | Total | |
| Distance (Km) | 5,401,858 | 5,697,962 | 155,674 | 11,255,494 |
| CO2 emissions (tonnes) | 833.52 | 626.73 | 12.10 | 1,472.36 |
| Waste Generated | |||
| 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | |
| Total waste generated | 4,415 | 4,710 | 4,339 |
| Of which sent to landfill | 1,436 | 1,520 | 1,571 |
| Of which recycled | 2,979 | 3,190 | 2,768 |
| % Waste recycled | 67.5% | 67.7 | 63.8 |
Paper Consumed in Production of Catalogues
2008
| Paper Type | Sustaintability Certified | Percentage of total paper consumption | Actual weight of paper consumed (tonnes) |
| Post-Consumer Waste Recycled | YES | 15% | 421.0 |
| Post-Consumer Waste Recycled | NO | 18% | 517.5 |
| Virgin | YES | 45% | 1,322.2 |
| Virgin | NO | 22% | 650.5 |
| Total weight of paper consumed in 2008 catalogues | 2,911.2 | ||
| Total number of catalogues produced in 2008 | 1,274,460 | ||
| Average weight per catalogue | 2.3Kg | ||
2009
| Paper Type | Sustaintability Certified | Percentage of total paper consumption | Actual weight of paper consumed (tonnes) |
| Post-Consumer Waste Recycled | YES | 12% | 225.37 |
| Post-Consumer Waste Recycled | NO | 17% | 311.75 |
| Virgin | YES | 52% | 949.00 |
| Virgin | NO | 19% | 338 |
| Total weight of paper consumed in 2009 catalogues | 1824.1 | ||
| Total number of catalogues produced in 2009 | 846,049 | ||
| Average weight per catalogue | 2.2Kg | ||
* Assumed 10.5 kilometres/litre of petrol consumed in the USA, and 12.75 kilometres/litre of petrol consumed in Europe and Asia Pacific.
** Natural gas conversion factors obtained from DEFRA (www.defra.gov.uk/environment/business/envrp/conversion-factors.htm). Fuel oil and propane conversion factors obtained from US Department of Energy (www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/1605/coefficients.html). Utilised World Resources Institute (WRI) recommended CO2 conversion factors (www.ghgprotocol.org/calculation-tools) for all other conversions.
Progree against 2009 Enviromental targets
| Target 2009 | Progress | Target 2010 |
Expand the “green facility” programme:
| We have designed a Platinum level of the Green Facility programme which includes a more demanding range of targets for facilities to meet. This will be made available at the beginning of the financial year. We have identified all facilities that achieved the status two or more years ago. All of these facilities will be required to complete their reassessment by the end of the second quarter of the current financial year. CPC in Preston, UK have been reassessed to standard green facility status.
| Recertify all Green Facilities that received the award during or before 2007 to standard Green Facility status or above by the end of quarter two 2010. Recertify all Green Facilities that received the award during 2008 to standard Green Facility status or above by the end of 2010. Assess two larger facilities to the Green Facility Platinum standard by the end of 2010. |
Implement additional carbon reduction projects at large facilities to ensure we achieve our goal of a CO2 emissions reduction equal to 10% of the emissions from these facilities in 2006 by the end of 2009. | The Group has completed its three-year carbon reduction programme. The investments made in the period 2007 to 2009 have resulted in a total of 6924 tonnes of carbon emissions being avoided. This reduction is equivalent to 23.4% of the emissions in our baseline year of 2006. The businesses have continued to develop plans to invest in energy efficiency and carbon reduction during 2010. | Implement projects at our owned facilities that will contribute towards a 10% reduction against the emissions from the baseline year of 2009 by the end of 2012. This is equivalent to a total reduction of 2478 tonnes of carbon avoided by the end of 2012. Establish a company energy efficiency recognition programme and award “Energy Saver” status to any facility demonstrating significant energy savings and management procedures.
|
Extend the evaluation of US environmental accreditation scheme to include the e-Stewards recycling programme and assess this accreditation’s suitability during FY10. | We have assessed the e-Stewards accreditation scheme, and it is not a suitable certification for the US businesses. The target businesses are specifically engaged in recycling electronic waste. We agree with the principles of the e-Stewards recycling programme, and as such we have taken steps to align our US business with these principles. The outcome of our evaluation is that we have developed a formal group policy requiring that all of our US businesses aim to dispose waste through Steward-certified electronic waste recyclers where possible in order to support the responsible handling and disposal of waste electronic equipment in the US. | Ensure that the company-wide e-waste management policy established in 2009 is being followed by requiring the following of our facilities; All EU facilities will complete and submit documentation detailing their annual electronic waste disposal by units or weight and supporting evidence that this disposal was carried out in compliance with the WEEE Directive. All USA/Canada facilities will complete and submit annual documentation detailing their annual electronic waste disposal by units or weigh and supporting evidence including details of the e-Stewards organisation used. Asia-Pacific region businesses will complete and submit documentation detailing their annual electronic waste disposals by units or weight in line with the procedure set out for their region in the group e-waste disposal policy. |
Progress the rationalisation of office equipment in the major US facilities. | This project has been reassigned following the departure of its team leader and will be driven during 2010. The US businesses are currently indexing their office equipment that can be replaced and building the project team. | Complete a review and any necessary upgrades to office equipment at our Ravenswood, Gaffney and Rockside facilities in the US. |
Continue to reduce the total tonnage of paper used by the Group to produce catalogues by 10%. Continue to use our influence as a company to drive our suppliers to develop papers with a higher recycled material content and processes with lower associated carbon emissions | We reduced the tonnage of paper used to produce our product catalogues by 37.3% in 2009. CPC did not print a catalogue during 2009. Newark increased the post-consumer waste recycled paper content of its catalogue this year from 45% to 48.5% We believe that we are currently printing the lightest-possible catalogues that meet the requirements of our marketing strategy. | Fully investigate opportunities to reduce the weight of paper used in our catalogues as they are identified by our printers. Broaden the scope of our measurement to include regularly-produced, paper-based marketing communications, such as our Tech First journals in the UK, and include the impact from these sources in future reporting. |
Continue to specify recycled and/or sustainability-certified paper e.g. FSC certified, where available and competitively-priced | During 2009, 64% of the paper used in our catalogues was sustainability-certified. | Continue to specify recycled and/or sustainability-certified paper e.g. FSC certified, where available and competitively-priced |
Maintain the high levels of recycling that have been achieved. | Whilst we have generated less waste overall in 2009 compared to 2008, our rate of recycling for 2009 was 67.5%. This is a decrease in performance of 0.2% over our 2008 rate. | Improve the group-wide recycling rate and achieve a percentage of waste recycled in 2010 that is higher than 67.5%. Improve the Leeds facilities' recycling rate by 5% during 2010. |
In those areas outside our direct control (for example the delivery of products to our customers by third party carriers), we seek to work with sustainable third parties and we engage with our suppliers on their approach to corporate responsibility and environmental stewardship.
We have undertaken energy audits at our main facilities and achieved reductions in carbon emissions for the last six years.
This year we have continued our ongoing programme of reducing the environmental impacts of our catalogues and direct mail activity, as well as engaging with our largest third party logistics supplier to develop the quantification of our scope 3 carbon emissions.
All of our large facilities have now achieved Green Facility status. This is a mark of sound environmental consideration by employees. It is measured through a system of self-assessment and improvement of their onsite environmental stewardship, and an audit of their performance.
During 2009, we began a reassessment programme to ensure that the standard of performance is maintained, as well as developing a new higher tier of the programme, to recognise our facilities that have accelerated their performance beyond expectation.
Two significant pieces of European environmental legislation affect the Group’s electronic component distribution businesses. These are the European Directives dealing with the Restriction of the use of certain Hazardous Substances (RoHS) in electronic and electrical equipment, and the disposal of Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE). The RoHS and WEEE legislation addresses the harmful effects of such waste in two ways: first by restricting the use of certain hazardous substances in electronic and electrical equipment and, second by imposing responsibilities to increase the recycling, re-use and recovery of such equipment.
Click here to view our policy on the disposal of Company electronic waste
The Group takes a proactive approach to reducing the environmental impact of its paper based marketing materials. The Farnell and CPC catalogues were both printed on the lightest-possible FSC certified paper feasible for the printing process.
As all the materials used in the Farnell catalogue production process are recyclable, we are encouraging customers to recycle their old editions upon receipt of the new publication.
The Newark 2008 catalogues were printed on recycled content and/or FSC or SFI certified paper. As of April 2008, all of MCM’s direct mail flyers were printed on FSC certified or recycled content paper.
As part of our drive towards the web, we are reducing the quantity of catalogues and direct mail that we print, in order to encourage our customers to move to our less-impactful transitional websites.
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