Ardent Office Solutions achieves Carbon Neutral status

It’s a fact of modern life that almost everything we do – flying, driving, even making a cup of tea – involves burning fossil fuels like oil, gas and coal. This in turn contributes CO2 to the atmosphere and adds to global warming, the big issue now facing our generation.

CarbonNeutral® is a brand mark developed by The Carbon Neutral Company and is awarded to companies who have reduced their CO2 emissions to net zero, in accordance with the Carbon Neutral Protocol.

The Carbon Neutral Protocol is in line with the World Resources Institute and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s Greenhouse Gas Protocol. It has been endorsed by a technical advisory group made up of experts, scientists, and businesses, to ensure Carbon Neutral organisations follow best practice.

To achieve the Carbon Neutral brand mark, Ardent Office Solutions went through a process which involved:

• Measuring CO2 emissions from travel, waste and energy
• Setting in motion plans to reduce CO2 gradually through internal changes
• Immediately reducing the remaining CO2 emissions to zero through carbon offsetting

Unfortunately it is impossible to totally eliminate all CO2 emissions, and where we are unable to do this we neutralise them by investing in renewable energy projects. Our current chosen project is the Guizhou Hydro Power Project which is the construction of small and medium hydro power stations in southwest China. This project will displace energy generated by fossil fuel power plants and generate emission reductions of an estimated 190,000 tCO2.

Why did Ardent decide to go Carbon Neutral?
 
Tackling climate change is becoming more and more important, and as part of our environmental management programme we felt that reducing and offsetting our CO2 emissions was the next progressive step to take. As part of our ongoing commitment to this we are continually looking at ways to reduce energy use and improve efficiency. In light of this we have put together a 3 year implementation plan to help us achieve this.

What initial changes have we made to reduce our Carbon Footprint

• All paper, card, printer consumables, packaging, stationery and paper waste are recycled where possible
• The use of recycled paper for all marketing material, and internal printed stationery is used where possible
• Implemented additional operating systems to allow all invoices, credits, statements, quotations and purchase orders to be sent electronically
• Improved current customer online ordering facility to allow the electronic ordering of office supplies, download of invoices, statements and management reports
• Implemented a vehicle tracking management system to enable us to analyse delivery practices to improve distribution efficiency by strategic route planning and reducing customer order frequency

What are our future plans to further reduce our Carbon Footprint

• Further reduce company vehicle CO2 emissions through the use of low emission fuel
• Energy efficient lighting
• The use of energy efficient products
• Switching to a Green Energy provider that provides electricity from a renewable energy like wind, solar, hydro-power and biomass which create little or no CO2 emissions.

How you can help make a difference

To help our customers have a greater understanding of their environmental impact we have put together an information site called “Eco Office” which can be viewed at www.ecooffice.org.uk. The site is full of tips, ideas, green brands and eco friendly products to help you make some quick but effective changes to your lifestyle at work and at home so together we can make a difference.