Carbon neutral for over a decade, carbon negative since 2020.
Connected is carbon negative, that is we store away or sequester more carbon than we use. And by 2030, we will have offset our total emissions since we founded in 1996.
Our carbon initiatives are broadly broken into three categories:
- Lower carbon density: Use less carbon by using carbon-efficient methodologies, travel, technology, suppliers, energy, investment, and waste.
- Reduced carbon consumption: Just using less makes a big difference. Technology helps us to reduce business miles by moving activity online. Super-skinny office models reduces commuting, energy, and waste levels.
- Removing carbon from the atmosphere. We plant trees and invest in other carbon capture projects.
Extract more carbon than you produce
At the end of 2019, the Governor of the Bank of England warned about the very real risks of the climate crisis. He went on to say “Companies and industries that are not moving towards zero-carbon emissions will be punished by investors and go bankrupt.”
The escalating climate crisis is the defining issue of the 21st century, the very survival of the planet is in our hands. We all have our part to play; whether that is junking the diesel cars, embarking on a tree planting programme or just simply cutting your carbon footprint – now is the time to act.
All organisations have their part to play and we have cut CO2 emissions by over 80% in twenty years, 100% of energy used is renewable, business travel miles are now 85%/15% public/private transport – the exact opposite of where it was at the turn of the century. Hybrid working for all arrived in 2013, blanket low emissions transport in 2015, and we achieved carbon negative status at the end of 2019.
We plan to do more:
- Continue improving the shape and size of our environmental footprint above and beyond just carbon to include gross consumption, recycling, plastic use, air pollution, fair trade, tax equality, and ethical sourcing.
- Spreading the word on climate issues and supporting individual causes and campaigns. We have always had a soft-spot for the planet we call home and now we’re directly spending to make sure the world can be a better place.
- Adjusting our working practices and policies to address the climate pinch-points that most businesses face. This includes zero commuting, no peak-hour travel, hybrid-working, home offices, supply-chain management, cloud-delivery of services, low-energy provision of digital services, and peer-to-peer hierarchy.
- Continually review our policy to ensure it is still relevant, up to date and correct. Learning and information changes understanding and we must adapt quickly and decisively.
- Not bow down to the gods of relentless growth-at-any-cost: Aggressively growing a business is wasteful, so we commit to grow our business organically, sustainably and be here for the long game, leaving as light a touch on the world around us.
- Avoid carbon-intensive investments. This means zero direct investment in high-carbon industries, and managing indirect exposure through green-focussed funds.
- Increasing our positive contribution to the planet over the years and by 2030 we plan to sequester five times the carbon we produce and recycle/upcycle 90% of what we consume (i.e. close to zero landfill waste).
- Fund the sequestering of carbon dioxide in trees, hedgerows, and plants in the U.K. This is done directly through Forest Carbon< (to May 2022) and indirectly through donations to The Woodland Trust. Both are UK-based and accredited, environmentally-friendly methods of carbon capture designed for a multi-decade life..
- Committed to piloting “direct-from-air” carbon capture projects. This is an emerging technology and in addition to carbon capture from planting.
- All transport is now low-carbon, specifically targeting non-public business travel where the majority of journeys will be zero emissions, new company vehicles are electric or plugin hybrid, flying will be actively discouraged, and zero rush-hour commuting.
- Finally, inspired by Microsoft, we are committed to remove our entire carbon footprint going back to 1996. This is on target to complete in 2030, thereby reversing all CO2 we have created.
There are always ways we can reduce CO2 output further and we actively look to the longer-term when making choices that affect carbon emissions.
For example, company vehicles cover business miles at an average of less than 50g/km. We can do better – by 2025 the business mileage average emissions are expected to drop by 50%. Rail travel, our preferred method of travel, emits approximately 14g per person per kilometre and the London tube is 9g/km. Net business travel CO2 emissions for the company is projected to fall under 15g/km by the end of 2025.
And not just us
We are, by quite some margin, the cleanest part of our supply chain, and we are working to “green” the whole shooting match by driving down energy usage at the core of digital service delivery, and by using more efficient suppliers, partners, and services. As of 2020, the operation of all our server hosting services are carbon neutral via renewable energy.
First published: 2011-06-14, updated 2022-05-08.
