The importance of Communicating your environmental performance

The Don’t Waste System offers clients the ability to easily monitor and report their environmental performance achieved through savings from their recycling and avoidance activities online in real-time. Waste generated from operations falls under  Scope 3 emissions, and our systems are able to provide transparency on waste movement, ensuring that our clients know where their waste ends up.

Reporting on environmental savings is crucial as organisations are required to provide substantial evidence demonstrating their sound environmental performance in order to maintain their corporate reputation and market position. This is due to the heightened urgency for companies to take positive environmental, social and governance (ESG) action. ESG reporting is therefore a key factor used by potential investors to evaluate the non-financial performance of a company (Read: ESG Ranking for business 101).

Your live waste data is linked to environmental performance metrics which calculate your overall environmental savings across a range of indicators. The environmental performance metrics we track include the volume of waste diverted from landfill, the number of litres of water saved, energy saved, water saved, and carbon saved.

DON’T WASTE’s Environmental performance metrics:

Over the years our clients have diverted a significant quantity of waste from landfill translating into significant environmental savings. In fact, since the inception of the Don’t Waste Group we achieved the following environmental savings in partnership with our clients across the globe:

This is the equivalent to the following environmental savings: 

• Volume Saved in 208 730 208 240L Wheelie Bins

• Water Saved in 792 909 Swimming Pools
• Carbon Dioxide Saved in 578 129 Homes Annually
• Trees Saved in 7 918 Square Kilometers Of Tropical Forest
• Energy Saved in 460 918 963 Litres Of Petrol

What is the link between waste management and greenhouse gas emissions?

Every type of waste treatment option has an environmental impact. We have found, however, that following the waste hierarchy when choosing treatment options ensures that we maximise environmental outcomes for clients (Read: What is in your waste stream?). Recycling, composting, waste to energy recovery and alternative waste management practices offer extensive benefits to the environment in comparison to sending waste to landfill or alternative disposal.  The Don’t Waste system can calculate the environmental savings associated with different treatment options.

For example, diverting 1 ton of food waste from landfill and composting it instead, allows you to save 2.86 tons of CO2e emissions. This is because when food waste decomposes in a landfill site it produces methane, a Greenhouse gas (GHG) that is 25 times more potent than carbon dioxide. Similarly, depending on the waste grade and treatment option used there is an associated carbon saving attached to avoiding, recycling and recovering waste. This is why finding alternatives to landfills is pivotal to reducing your scope 3 emissions.

Moreover, there is a significant link between waste management and climate change (Read: Waste Management and the fight against climate change). In light of the climate crisis and the highly anticipated COP27 to be held in Egypt in November, there is a drive to reduce scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions across industries and hence focusing on prioritising environmental savings is imperative.

SHOWCASING YOUR ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE

Now that we understand why communicating your environmental performance is important, we have collated a few of the possible ways to showcase your environmental savings to various stakeholders. The CEP portal enables you to provide an attractive visual display of your site’s performance over a date range of your choice. The performance metrics are conveniently available as a website link for your to publicly showcase your savings through your internet browser. The screens alternative your environmental performance metrics allowing you to engage your audience.

CEP can be displayed in various ways:

• Display on screens, billboards, televisions, or digital displays within your organisation
• Share internally with employees to drive awareness of environmental achievements
• Send to potential clients and key stakeholders to demonstrate your commitment to protecting the environment
• Share online on your website and social media platforms

Don’t Waste is committed to driving improvements in environmental performance for our clients. Our mission is to protect the environment, and CEP is how we measure it. Get in touch to start communicating your environmental performance and reaching your waste minimisation goals.

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Don’t Waste provides industry leading business intelligence, site management, and waste management services to Property, Retail, Commercial, Industrial and Hospitality industries. Our customers include the world’s leading property management groups. To find out more about our innovative value-added systems and services in onsite waste operations, contact:

Linus Naik- Group General Manager: Sustainability & Business Development (Email: I Mobile: +27 82 552 0675).

Michael Foreman- UK Managing Director and International Business Development (Email: I Mobile: +44 7939 027193).