Sustainability In Construction: How The Industry Aims To Reduce Its Carbon Footprint

The issue of being sustainable has become a concern for most people in society. Nowadays, people are aware of their impact on the planet and feel like they have a personal responsibility to be more sustainable. The same goes for businesses too and many are starting to realise how they are impacting the environment and are now looking for ways to reduce that impact. Including in this is construction. The construction industry  has a significant impact on carbon emissions, which is why it is so important to find ways to reduce its carbon footprint. Ultimately, it is the responsibility of everyone to try and be more sustainable, whether that is on an individual level or for your entire business. If you run a construction business and you are interested in reducing your carbon footprint and improving your sustainability, then keep on reading to find out our top tips.

Assess The Current Way Of Working

One of the first things you need to do to reduce your carbon footprint is to assess your current way of working. There is no way you can start to change how you work without figuring out what you are doing wrong. So, take the time to assess every part of your business and make some notes about which parts could be improved. Within your construction business, there are lots of different areas of your work that you may not even notice are not sustainable. For example, in the office part of your business, you may find that you are using a lot of unnecessary single-use plastic, which is something that is super harmful to the environment. A great way to solve this problem is to start buying your office supplies from sustainable suppliers and ones that use either paper packaging or recycled plastic. If you find you are struggling with identifying what is wrong with your business, then it could be a good idea to hire a specialist who can go through everything and tell you what is wrong and how you can improve it. 

Source Materials Responsibly

Another good way to reduce your carbon footprint is to source your materials responsibly. Within a construction business, you are going to be using a lot of materials and you may not always know where these materials come from and whether they are sustainable. So, if you are wanting to be a more sustainable business and you want to reduce your carbon footprint, then you need to start thinking about where you are sourcing all your materials from. For example, if your company uses a lot of cement within a month, then it would be a good idea to contact a cement supplier that offers low carbon options, like Hanson, and source your concrete from them. The benefits of using a concrete supplier is  that you can take your time to find the right concrete for your project. Your concrete supplier will be able to go through everything with you and make sure that you are getting the best and low-energy products. For a company that is wanting to reduce its carbon footprint, it would be in your best interest to source your materials responsibly and consider going with a concrete supplier. 

Minimise Waste

Minimising the waste you produce is another great way to reduce your carbon footprint and be a more sustainable construction business. As mentioned above, although you are a construction company, you will also still have a lot of admin work that goes on behind the scenes. A lot of administrative work will be done on a computer, but you will still have a lot of waste coming from all the paper you use. So, you need to implement some sort of system within your offices that minimise the waste that is create throughout the day. It would also be a good idea to have a recycling system within your business so when things did get thrown away, at least they can be reused. This policy of minimising waste should be used throughout your whole business. It doesn’t matter if someone is working in your office or if they are working on the construction site itself, everyone needs to take the initiative to become more sustainable and reduce their carbon footprint.

Train Your Staff

Carrying on from the point above, training your staff is going to be one of the best things you can do to reduce your carbon footprint. Being more sustainable and reducing your carbon footprint as a business relies on everyone working together to do their bit. Of course, as a business leader, it is your job to implement certain changes like sourcing your materials responsibly, but you also need to take some initiative and train your staff so they can implement those changes too. Teamwork is always going to be the best way forward for this, so you need to take the time to come up with changes and then take some more time to train your staff. You may also find that as your business progresses with its journey, you find new things that can help you reduce your carbon footprint. If this is the case, then make sure you are updating your staff and training them again, so they are all up to date with the policies. It will benefit everyone if the entire team is up to date with the workings of the business.

Summary

Ultimately, as a business, you do have the responsibility to reduce your carbon footprint and become more sustainable. This is, of course, easier said than done, particularly for a construction company, but that doesn’t mean you should try to implement policies. The construction industry as a whole is all looking for ways to reduce its  carbon footprint and if your company is trying to do the same, then hopefully you can use some of the tips in this article to help you and your team out.