Sustainable Cities

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September 2015

Exclusive interview with Environment Secretary Liz Truss It’s vital that we create the right environment for small businesses to flourish and make it as easy to open and expand a business in Cornwall as it is in Camden We will be responsible for the biggest government data giveaway that Britain has ever seen I want to see Britain’s food and farming industry as a world leader

INSIDE How London plans to become the ultra-low emission capital of Europe DISTRIBUTED WITHIN THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH, PRODUCED AND PUBLISHED BY LYONSDOWN WHICH TAKES SOLE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE CONTENTS

Business Reporter · September 2015

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Sustainable cities

Opening shots René Carayol

T

HE GROWING industry and expertise around sustainable cities is both necessary and exciting. But most of the excitement is generated by some of the latest developments, from China where many new cities are under construction, to Europe where futuristic visions are becoming reality. These developments are attracting the best brains, the most progressive businesses and breathtaking amounts of investment. This is good news, and certainly must continue.

However, at the other end of the spectrum, there are many old and moribund cities that are creaking and crumbling, not only because of a lack of investment, but mainly because there was never an overarching plan for their future development. Far too many of these worrying cases of a lack of structured urban development, unfortunately, are experiencing rapid growth and are in Africa.

I was recently in Nairobi, the sprawling capital of Kenya. In 2000 its population was just over two million. By 2010, it had grown to 3.3 million and, by 2020, it will be 4.8 million. In a further five years it will be nearly six million. This is explosive growth by any measure, but becomes dangerously

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THE ESSENTIALS

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Why new thinking should be exploited by those who do not yet have sustainable lives so when the creaking and unstable infrastructure is taken into account.

The first sign of the lack of planning and provision was the journey from the airport to my hotel in Nairobi. It’s only around 12km but it takes a depressing three hours to get there. This is nothing compared with the four to five hours it takes first thing in the morning – hitting the back-to-back traffic at 5am on the return to the airport.

Like many of Africa’s cities, when Nairobi became the capital, the one road that connected it to the hinterland of Kenya, and to the capitals of its neighbours, is still the only route in and out of town.

The traffic congestion is alarming, and the fumes and potholes left by the gargantuan trucks travelling from the ports to various regional capitals leaves the roads in a state of constant disrepair.

There are many tourist excursions to the infamous Kibera slums in Nairobi.

While there is much to admire, especially the entrepreneurial zeal of most of its inhabitants, it is impossible to leave without starting to understand why the few who become able to do so leave to change their lives for the better.

Slumdog Millionaire has given us a rosetinted view of life in the slums but, while being impressed by the ingenuity of the inhabitants and the ad-hoc architecture, and perhaps smiling at stolen electricity and “free” satellite connections, this is still just so unacceptable. Many of these slums appear to be sustainable, mainly due to local self-regulating communities that really do look out and care for each other, but scratch beneath the surface and dayto-day living becomes seriously tenuous with little guarantee of tomorrow.

We happened to be in Kibera when a flash storm came pelting down. The wellheeled tourists were gone in a flash, whisked away in smart minibuses. The locals have nowhere else to go.

In Africa, the onus is always on a much beleaguered government to sort all social problems, especially housing. It might just be an idea to think about bringing new investment in, alongside new ideas.

There is much to be learned from the new thinking around sustainable cities, but there is no reason why this cannot be also exploited by those who do not yet have sustainable lives.

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…according to new research, that’s what we could save by 2050 through investing in sustainability

By Joanne Frearson INVESTING IN public and lowemission transport, building efficiency and waste management in cities could generate savings with a current value of $17trillion by 2050, according to research from the New Climate Economy.

However, the saving could be as high as $22trillion if there were also complementary national policies such as support for lowcarbon innovation, reduced fossil fuel subsidies and carbon pricing.

Nick Godfrey (right), head of policy and urban development at the New Climate Economy and an author of the report, says: “$17 trillion in savings is actually a very conservative estimate, because it only looks at direct energy savings generated from investment, which are a small

Authorities in cities such as Rio de Janeiro are spearheading sustainability initiatives

proportion of the wider social, economic, and environmental benefits of these investments.”

The report suggested there were still various barriers that have to be overcome if the significant economic benefits of climate action were to be realised and outlines the role international co-operation can play in accelerating action in reducing greenhouse gas

emissions. T he repor t re com me nde d t h at t he international community should develop an integrated package of $1billion or more over five years to help accelerate and scale up low-carbon urban strategies in at least the world’s largest 500 cities.

There were five areas the report

suggested that it was vital to have collaboration on. The first included facilitating knowledgesharing among cities on policy reform and innovation to inform and inspire action. The second was about using common platforms and standards to enable cities to make their commitments public, credibly record their energy use and GHG emissions, develop low-carbon strategies and measure their results.

The third concerned building the capacity of local governments, so that political leaders and municipal staff can effectively plan, design and execute lowcarbon development plans and strategies. The fourth looked at financing low-carbon urban infrastructure by improving cities’ access to domestic and international financial markets and the fifth outlined supporting

governments to empower cities to invest and innovate.

Organisations such as the C40 Cities Climate Leadership Group and Local Governments for Sustainability have already helped cities seize these initiatives to reduce emissions. A new global framework, the Compact of Mayors, is also calling for city officials to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, enhance resilience to climate change and track their progress transparently.

Eduardo Paes, mayor of Rio de Janeiro and Chair of C40 Cities, says: “Better, more resilient models of urban development are critical for rapidly urbanising cities in the developing world.

Cities around the world are

already leading the way in implementing sustainable and innovative urban solutions. By sharing and scaling-up these best practices through international collaboration, cities can save money and accelerate global climate action.”

There have been already 130 cities representing more than 220 million people that have made a commitment to the Compact of Mayors. Michael R Bloomberg, the UN SecretaryGeneral’s special envoy for cities and climate change, says: “The steps that cities take to shrink carbon footprints also reduce their energy costs, improve public health, and help attract new residents and businesses.”

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Sustainable cities

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Unlocking potential by connecting the UK’s cities Sir David Higgins, chairman of HS2 Ltd, on why connectivity is the key to sustainable urban development

Cities such as Birmingham (below) and Leeds (bottom) will benefit from HS2’s reduction in journey times to the capital

B

ritain’s future is as a knowledge-based economy. That means more creative industries, more services, hi-tech research and development.

It will also be a more urbanised future. In fact, projections suggest that, on current trends, by 2050, 89 per cent of us will be living in cities, up from 82 per cent today. That means an extra 14 million people, more than the combined populations of Greater London and Greater Manchester today. That’s important because living in the city helps people be more creative.

It’s much easier to invent things, share problems and seek solutions collaboratively when you’ve got easy access to other skilled people. It’s the reason that, despite the digital revolution of the last decade, despite the fact that we now have more methods of instant communication at our fingertips than ever before, people still value face-to-face meetings and passenger demand continues to grow. Despite Twitter, Facebook, Skype and all the rest, people keep flocking to the city.

The problem is that this process, of increasing urbanism and the move to a knowledge-based economy, is increasingly benefiting some cities over others – partly because highskilled workers are more likely to move in search of work.

And increasingly, when they move, they move to London.

Working in a dynamic labour market, they build skills and networks faster than their compatriots in other cities. In turn, businesses come, attracted by the skills, and the circle repeats.

This concentration of business, finance and commerce in London and the South East has had undeniable benefits for the people of London and the UK as a whole – and will continue to do so. The problem is that the gap between London and the rest is increasingly becoming counterproductive, both for London itself and the rest of the country. The contrast in productivity is stark. In London, labour productivity is 50 per cent higher than in the north.

What is HS2?

•T he first phase will connect London Euston with a new station at Birmingham Curzon Street, next to the Bullring and existing Moor Street station. Work is scheduled to start in 2017 with the first services running in 2026.

•A second phase, due to open by 2033, will continue north with one leg linking Birmingham with Leeds, via the East Midlands and Sheffield while another leg will link Birmingham with Manchester via Crewe.

• New stations at Old Oak Common in west London and Birmingham Airport will help unlock new areas for jobs and housing as well as local and international connections.

For Londoners it is translating into ever-increasing cost of living. For business it means paying higher wages just to keep up with the cost of living – and especially housing.

Dealing with the problem will be hard – but the prize is immense. HM Treasury analysis shows that realising the ambition to rebalance the UK economy would be worth an additional £56billion in nominal terms to the northern economy, or £44billion in real terms, equal to £1,600 per individual in the north. That’s why HS2 is so important.

The first phase, from London to Birmingham, will dramatically improve capacity, tripling the number of seats out of Euston and providing much needed space for intercity travel to continue to grow.

By providing significantly faster, more reliable connections between London and the major cities of the north, HS2 will help to level the playing field and make the north a more attractive place to do business. Birmingham, for example, would be about half an hour closer to London, but also a solid hour closer to Leeds. Journeys that used to take more than two hours, like London-Manchester, will be brought down to just over one hour.

Of course, HS2 is no silver bullet. But the dramatically improved capacity and connectivity it provides will be a powerful catalyst for our cities and regions to capitalise on. Business clearly wants it to happen. Earlier this year HSBC announced plans to move its retail banking HQ from London to Birmingham, citing HS2 as one of the key reasons they chose the city. For them it makes business sense – closer to their nationwide chain of

high street banks, and cheaper all round, for them and their employees.

Other towns and cities will also benefit. From day one, HS2 will be integrated with the existing network to allow services to reach destinations north of Birmingham such as Stoke-onTrent, Liverpool, Manchester, north Wales, Preston, Carlisle and onward to Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Similar to the way the first motorways took longdistance traffic off local roads, the first phase of HS2 will take pressure off the existing West Coast Mainline and free up much needed space for freight and extra local services to places like Milton Keynes, Northampton and Rugby.

In effect, returning use of the West Coast Mainline to the communities that live along it.

This is important because HS2 is not a replacement for the existing rail network. It is an extension, a supplement and a support. We need it because we cannot continue to squeeze extra capacity out of our existing infrastructure by patching and mending.

Over the last 20 years the number of people travelling by train has doubled, and it continues to grow at around 5 per cent a year. Faced with that sort of growth we need to think big and plan for the future. A future where more people live in cities. A future where their sustainable growth will be more and more important, and where people will demand faster, more reliable intercity transport. That is what HS2 is all about.

Sir David Higgins

www.gov.uk/hs2

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GETTING IN THE ZONE

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How London plans to become the ultra-low emission vehicle capital of Europe

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H E N L on don mayor Boris Johnson tightened the low emission zone standards to include large vans three years ago, the London Assembly received hundreds of letters of protest, saying things like: “I have to re-mortgage my house because I have to buy a new van as my current one does not comply!”

“This work is brutal,” says Isabel Dedring, deputy mayor for transport, who is under no illusion that the newly announced plans to make London the ultra-low emission vehicle capital of Europe will be any easier. “These are politically difficult decisions to make,” she said. “The upside is, however, that the impact of a politician prepared to take difficult decisions and an effective campaign can be transformative. In London we have a very effective lobby on air quality and a mayor prepared to do unpopular things.”

The new plans to make London the ultra-low emission vehicle capital of Europe include improving the congestion charge discount for ultra-low emission vehicles, increasing the number of electric vehicle charging points, and the provision of decommissioning grants to taxis that are more than 10 years old in a bid to encourage them to switch to electric cars.

It is political pressure like this, Dedring believes, that has made London one of the leading cities on clean air and air pollution issues. London currently complies with eight of the nine regulated pollutants. Since Johnson was elected in 2008, the number of Londoners living in areas exceeding the EU legal limits for nitrogen dioxide has been halved.

Even so, the city still faces a considerable nitrogen dioxide challenge, but September’s introduction of the new ultra-low emission zone for all vehicles in central London is expected to further halve emissions of nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter from vehicle exhausts. It will require vehicles travelling in the Congestion Charge Zone of central London to meet new emission standards or pay a daily charge.

“It is the first time we have set an emissions standard for everyone,” says Dedring. “London already has a low emissions zone which covers lorries, coaches, buses, and vans but people are probably not that aware of it. If you just drive a car you wouldn’t know about it but it really has had a big impact. What we are trying to do now is to adopt a much more comprehensive approach.

“We are lucky in London that we are able to do things like this because of the way we were established through the Greater London Authority Act. I quite often hear people say, when they look at other cities, why don’t they introduce

Eleri Evans talks to Isabel Dedring about the challenges in developing a greener transport policy for the capital

a congestion charge like London.

Why aren’t 20 other cities doing it?

And it is largely because of the way we were set up.

“There is an interesting dynamic, however, as it creates an economic burden of several hundred million pounds on industry because they have had to replace vehicles faster than they might otherwise have wanted to.

“I have heard people say we should have done it faster or to a higher standard but you have to find a balance. The reality is that there have not been enough low-emission vehicles available on the market. That has changed now. These are no longer concept-type cars in a

showroom – they are being made commercially.”

In the past 12 months London has seen a big increase in electric cars.

Dedring said the Greater London postcode areas contain 8,000 electric vehicles, 45,000 petrol-electric hybrids and 750 diesel electric hybrids. London accounts for 11 per cent of petrol-electric hybrid car sales in the UK, even though it only accounts for 6 per cent of all car sales.

London has experienced a mood shift over the past 10 to 15 years, says Dedring, that has seen a 9 per cent shift out of cars and a 30 per cent reduction in traffic in central London. “It is a very significant and

continuing trend. It is partly because of the Congestion Charge and partly because we have adopted a range of policies such as bus lanes, cycle lanes and pedestrianisation schemes.

“What the London experience shows is that if you provide affordable, attractive alternative to cars that are actually faster and easier, people are prepared to do without cars. The ways you encourage people out of their cars is not by telling them they can’t drive but by providing them with better ways to get around.

“We have already passed the point where 50 per cent of the world’s population live in cities. In about 50 to 100 years, I imagine lots and lots of people will still be living in cities. The idea that they are going to be living in cities with more traffic, with more

Deputy mayor for transport Isabel Dedring is championing low emissions targets in London; Inset: London mayor Boris Johnson

polluting vehicles or the same polluting vehicles, is not realistic.

“We all believe there is going to be more pedestrianisation and more clean air. These things are going to accelerate because the more people live in city environments the more pressure there is for these environments to be clean and attractive. People want to move the city forward in a way that creates more attractive environments and a good quality of life.

“To me it seems inevitable that this is the direction that cities go in. The upside for politicians if they are prepared to do stuff like the ultra-low emissions zone is that they are seen as being at the cutting edge, the forefront. That counteracts the fear of not wanting to take decisions that are unpopular.”

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The tale of more than two cities: learning Europe’s transport lessons T RANSPORT is part of the identity of every country, town and city. How people travel tells you much about who they are, just as their buildings, their history and their politics do.

And, like all of these things, transport generates stories, which people tell to explain why things are as they are, or why they are not as people would like them to be. Some stories are told among transport specialists and others are told more widely, in the media, in politics and by ordinary people. Some stories contain important elements of the truth, while yet others are more like urban myths, spread because they suit a prejudice, a legitimate desire or a vested interest.

Several years of listening to these myths persuaded me to write my book Urban Transport Without The Hot Air. It begins with 10 questions designed to explore how these myths may have influenced the reader. To take just two examples: • W hat happened to the duty on petrol between 2000 and 2012? (It went down by 16 per cent, after inflation) • What percentage of Manchester’s commuters travel by tram?(1.4 per cent)

Dr Steve Melia lectures in transport and planning at the University of the West of England, Bristol. His interest in sustainable transport began as a teenager when he drove through a red light into the side of a van from the police accident prevention unit: he lost his licence and bought a bicycle.

Studying transport and climate change led him to stop flying in 2005, followed by a move to a flat in a city, where he now lives without a car.

If those answers surprised you, you are not alone. The first part of the book is all about myth-busting and the second part is about solutions. One conclusion I have come to is that urban congestion will always be with us. It could be solved in theory; we already have all the technology we need. The problem is political.

For as long as people want to own and drive vehicles, making their own decisions about journeys, cities will be congested at peak times.

Since the 1950s, governments and transport planners have directed most of their efforts towards a problem that cannot be solved; imagine what could be achieved if all that energy and money was directed at solvable problems. If we set congestion to one side, the list of those other problems is long and some of them – like climate change, community severance and early deaths due to air pollution – are more important.

Over three summers, while I was doing my PhD, I cycled over 5,000 miles across seven European countries, visiting cities that had been successful in reducing motor traffic and improving the quality of their urban environment. They still get congested at peak times, but they are much better places to live and work today than they used to be. Three of these cities – Freiburg, Groningen and Lyon – provide case studies for the book, as do London, Brighton and Cambridge.

All of those cities have reduced car driving in a context of rising population and constraints on road space. Some, like London and Lyon, have focused more on public transport; others, like Groningen and Cambridge, on cycling – but all have made controversial changes, including road closures and parking restraint.

Looking to Europe for good practice can be a two-edged sword. In many accounts you can

read online, the sun always shines, plans are smoothly implemented and nothing ever seems to go wrong. This has fostered another myth, that they can do all those things on “the continent” whereas we could never do them over here. In reality, these cities suffered many of the same battles and barriers that we have in Britain.

The transformation of Groningen, for example, began with a traffic scheme in 1977, which unleashed years of bitter conflict between the city council and the chamber of commerce, who believed that removing traffic from the city centre would kill businesses. The initial plan divided the centre into four segments. People could drive in and out but any through-traffic had to go round. So if you were moving around the city centre it became much quicker to cycle or walk. Over the years the principle has been extended. Some streets have been entirely pedestrianised and the principle of filtered permeability – giving a short-cut to cyclists and pedestrians and a detour to general traffic – has been applied across the whole city. Today Groningen has one of the lowest levels of urban car driving in the Western world, and its chamber of commerce has become a strong supporter of traffic-free city centres.

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City limits

Successful transport reforms in cities, such as encouraging cycling in Groningen (left) and revamping Lyon’s riverside car park into a linear public space (below left and above) have served as models for equivalents in UK cities such as Cambridge (below). But such expansive civic projects need to come with a beneficial “wow factor” if they are to be backed by the public, says Dr Steve Melia.

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How our small community in Cornwall can show the cities how to work as one EXPERT INSIGHT

Simon Ashby

Visits to the Netherlands have produced some Damascene conversions of British transport planners and local politicians. A visit to Groningen played a key part in the Cambridge Core Traffic Scheme, which applied the same principle of filtered permeability with a series of road closures in the 1990s and early 2000s. The bus gate on Bridge Street was one of the first and most important stages. The approach was more gradual than in Groningen but the outcomes were similar; it is now much easier and quicker to cross Cambridge city centre by bike than it is to drive.

Car ownership has been falling in British cities (but rising in small towns and rural areas) for many years now. Cambridge is an interesting example of a city with a rapidly expanding economy, rapidly rising incomes and rapidly falling car ownership – as well as traffic volumes in the inner areas. There are many reasons for that, but without the Core Traffic Scheme, things could have been very different.

Investment in public transport has driven the transformation of transport in London in a context of rising population and constraints on road capacity. Hundreds of minor changes to roads and footpaths have progressively reduced

road capacity in the central areas. Traffic volumes would have declined even without the Congestion Charge. And car ownership will continue to decline for there is no space to match a rising population with more cars on London’s roads.

A key conclusion of my book is that positive changes, like improvements to public transport, make surprisingly little difference unless they are accompanied by traffic restraint of some kind. But as restraint is always unpopular it needs to come with big visible improvements – the “wow factor” that makes people think, I’d never go back to how it was. In that respect, the leaders of European cities have done much better than their UK counterparts, who are more likely to avoid or water down radical plans in the face of opposition.

The mayor of Lyon staked his political future on plans to transform the banks of the river Rhône from a linear car park into a linear park, with a cycle track, promenade and tiered seating. Public outcry beforehand turned to appreciation afterwards. Posters reminding voters how it used to look helped secure his re-election with a landslide majority. It is a lesson that many of our leaders could learn from.

MY WIFE and I are lucky to live in the country in a small Cornish community. We keep chickens, grow our own food and have even helped to rear pigs. We also have access to a wide range of sustainable businesses, offering high quality products from locally sourced food and drink to wood-powered heating and clothing.

So most of the money we spend is retained in Cornwall.

For the majority of people who live in larger towns and cities, sustainable living is much harder. When we lived in a city, our energy and food bills were much higher than they are now.

We also had less access to locally sourced produce and sustainable businesses in general. Like many cities, our high street consisted of the usual national and international brands and our food was mostly from supermarkets. There were also much lower levels of community-level sustainability. While we knew our neighbours, we could not call on them in a crisis. Now we have at least 20 people we can rely on, and who rely on us, all within a two-mile radius. We also have access to a range of community-run services (buses, ice gritting, social events, and so on).

However, contrary to what you or my fellow country dwellers might think, there is no reason why our cities should not be sustainable.

After all, people live much closer together and are generally much closer to the resources they need (our nearest shop is three miles away). City dwellers also have public transport systems, while we have to drive 45 miles to catch a train and 30 miles to go to work. It is just that sustainable living in cities requires more careful planning.

One interesting development that we often drive past is the new town of Cranbrook, located just east of Exeter. The vision for this town is to create “a self-sufficient, low-carbon new community in close

proximity to skilled employment opportunities, encouraging people to use sustainable modes of transport and to reduce the need for them to travel between work and home by car.”

Meaning that the people living in the town should not only be able to get jobs from the businesses in and around the new town, which includes a science park and Skypark at the nearby Exeter Airport, but also other benefits such as energyefficient housing, community biomass heating and electricity, new train and bus services, easily accessible local amenities like shops and surgeries, as well as – very importantly – affordable housing for lower paid workers, a key problem for many South West children being that they can’t afford to live in the region in which they grew up.

Some big UK businesses have also launched some interesting initiatives, such as Siemens’ The Crystal, a London-based exhibition of what the sustainable city of the future might look like. Shell also has its New Lenses on Future Cities initiative. However, I cannot help but think that while such grand visions from international businesses, governments and councils may be inspiring, there is also a need to involve local businesses of all sizes in such projects. Such firms are better placed to spot the opportunities for both profit and social and environmental capital, goals which are not as mutually exclusive as you might think.

So don’t sit back and wait for it to happen in a city near you. It is rare to have the chance to participate in the creation of new sustainable communities – rather the sustainable cities of the future will require change from within existing urban structures. Ensure you exploit the chances sustainable city living can bring before some other business does.

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The big interview Liz Truss EXCLUSIVE Eleri Evans

T

HE UK is one of the most innovative food nations in the world. British food and drink is on supermarket shelves, and in bars and restaurants, from Beijing to Bogota, and yet Liz Truss MP, Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, still wants more.

Truss is hugely ambitious to secure the future sustainability of Britain’s food and farming industry, describing it as a powerhouse that contributes more than £100billion each year to the economy and employs one in eight people. Recent years have seen exports of British wine, beer, biscuits, cheese – and even chillies – rise significantly.

“I want to see Britain’s food and farming industry as a world leader,” she said. “It is already making great progress. Overall, UK exports of food and drink having risen by £1.2billion since 2010 to nearly £19billion but I want to see it expand and grow even further.”

When I ask her how she can support the sustainability of the industry she talks about the new Great British Food Unit that has been established to celebrate top-quality British produce both at home and abroad.

She clearly felt it was needed. Last year, in her speech to Conservative Conference, she described it as a “disgrace” that the UK still imported two-thirds of its apples, two-thirds of its cheese and nine-tenths of its pears, despite the growth in popularity of British varieties abroad.

“The Great British Food Unit will boost jobs, skills, investment, and export opportunities in the food and farming sector. It will champion existing consumer trust in our uncompromising standards of qualit y, authenticity, safety and animal welfare as well as provenance based on proud local identity. It will help businesses to produce and sell more British food.” She adds that people increasingly appreciate the importance of food.

“People are demanding healthier, seasonal food to cook at home. And they want nutritious ingredients, too, sourced locally where possible.”

Elected as the Conservative MP for South West Norfolk in 2010, Truss, promoted to the Cabinet after just four years as an MP, is keen to see technology used to help grow the rural economy, protect the natural environment, and boost the UK’s food and farming industry. She wants to export the data revolution powering wealth creation and innovation in urban areas to the countryside.

“Connecting data, technology and ideas can help us harness the potential in food, in the environment and the countryside. The scientific know-how and flair for innovation in the UK farming industry puts us in a superb position to take advantage of the benefits of new technology

Conne tech ideas ca harness t in the e and meet the increasing global demand for food.”

The role of Secretary of State for the Environment, to which she was appointed in July 2014, is clearly not just about cowsheds, flood barriers and the great outdoors. At the heart of her digital vision is her plan to put Britain at the front of the open data revolution by releasing datasets from the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra).

Defra’s rich archive of datasets includes the tracking of animal movements since the Second World War, the monitoring of the rural economy since Domesday and, since the 1940s, changes to family eating habits, like the arrival of spaghetti bolognese. Truss hopes the data will be harnessed to bring the productivity of the countryside up to the level of UK towns and cities.

She says: “Defra has more broad, varied and rich data than any other government department. We are opening our vast data vaults as part of our ongoing goal to boost growth and improve productivity. Our year-long plan is to make our rich archive of over 8,000 datasets, packed with millions of records, freely available for anyone to use, including app developers and other entrepreneurs.

It will be the biggest government data giveaway Britain has ever seen.

“Environmental and geospatial data are the top two data categories in demand by companies.

By using cutting-edge data sources, such as Copernicus satellites, and building better links between our science and wider research networks

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necting data, hnology and an help us to the potential environment we will improve the way we collect and use data.

Farmers will be able to find the best soils for their crops and supermarkets can monitor whether the fish they buy are from sustainable sources.”

Ensuring the food and farming industry becomes a top destination for graduates is another important step towards sustainability, says Truss, who, before entering parliament, was deputy director at the think tank Reform. “We need to ensure food and farming attracts sufficient numbers of entrepreneurial, talented new entrants,” she says.

“We will triple the number of food and farming apprenticeships and are boosting investment in the latest technologies.”

Truss believes farming has significantly moved on over the past 50 years and has never looked more exciting. She points out that Defra has an ambitious science programme designed to research ways to help make farming more productive and protect against serious threats to animal and plant health. She adds that the government has committed £160millon to develop farming technology.

“This is just one way we are supporting innovative projects which will help secure the future of our food and farming industry and improve profitability.

Projects such as the precision-farming and handsfree tractors of Riviera Produce in Cornwall to Lincolnshire University’s development of 3D camera technology to identify when broccoli can be harvested are just a couple of examples of this.”

Other innovative production techniques have seen Defra work across the industry to develop voluntary agreements to ensure the sustainable use of resources – as a result, says Truss, many

companies are experimenting with renewable energies to help reduce the UK’s carbon footprint.

She highlights work by McCain Foods, which has invested in wind turbines and an anaerobic lagoon which digests waste water to create a gas that can then be stored and used to produce electricity. Thanet Earth, too, one of the UK’s largest glasshouse complexes uses the latest combined heat and power (CHP) technology – a system that simultaneously generates electricity and thermal energy – to power its greenhouses.

Warming to her theme, she says: “The rural economy has extraordinary vitality and is worth more than £210billion a year – but it could generate billions more for the UK and provide thousands of new jobs over the next decade. We need to protect and develop our rural environment.

“Rural communities deserve the same opportunities as urban ones, which is why we launched our Productivity Plan which will unleash the full potential of rural areas by strengthening connectivity through improved mobile and transport connections. I am determined to make sure the countryside becomes an even more attractive place for people to live, work, start a business and bring up their family, particularly by overcoming housing constraints and improving access to affordable childcare for working parents.

“By doing this we can boost productivity, grow the rural economy and safeguard the long-term success of our towns and villages. It’s vital that we create the right environment for small businesses to flourish and make it as easy to open and expand a business in Cornwall as it is in Camden.”

9

The Edible Bus Stop project in Lambeth has won the London council Sustainable City status

NOT SURE whether to buy local or organic, fish or meat, from the farmers’ market or supermarket? Help is at hand with the first cities in the UK being awarded sustainable food city status. Brighton & Hove, Cardiff, Plymouth and the London Borough of Lambeth have won the awards in recognition of their work to promote healthy and sustainable food.

Brighton & Hove won a silver award as the first city in the UK to have food growing written into planning guidelines for new residential developments, and to require all council food procurement to meet minimum health and sustainability standards. Its food-growing space project has seen successful development applications incorporating food growing space increase in the area from 1 per cent to 38 per cent.

Cardiff, Plymouth and Lambeth all won bronze awards. Cardiff won its award for improving the availability of land for allotments and encouraging community growing in unusual spaces. In Plymouth the award was for its cooperative of 30 local producers, which now delivers affordable, sustainable food to collection points in deprived parts of the city.

Lambeth was recognised for its “edible” bus stops, which turn disused land into vegetable gardens, and its social supermarket, which sells subsidised products to those on low incomes.

The seaside towns of Bournemouth and Poole also won an award when they became the first Sustainable Fish Cities in the world. The two towns won the accolade after caterers serving more than 2.5 million meals across Bournemouth and Poole committed to serving only demonstrably sustainable fish.

All of the towns and cities are members of the Sustainable Food Cities Network, an alliance of public, private and third-sector organisations that use food as a vehicle for positive change. Through partnership with local authorities, charities, businesses and community

UK’s first sustainable food cities make the grade groups, cities within the Sustainable Food Cities Network are working to tackle social, economic and environmental issues such as food poverty and obesity.

Sustainable Food Cities national programme manager Tom Andrew said: “The awards recognise the extraordinary innovation and effort these cities have made to change attitudes and perceptions about food and create a more sustainable food system. Five years ago there were only a handful of places taking a united approach to promoting healthy, local, affordable food; today there are 40 and more and more are starting the journey each month through Sustainable Food Cities.

“In the absence of national government action, cities are taking on the incredibly serious food challenges that face us all and are creating one of the fastest growing social movements in the UK today. Food is not only at the heart of some of today’s greatest challenges but is also a vital part of the solution.”

The Sustainable Food Cities programme takes a cross-sector partnership approach to work across six key areas: promoting healthy and sustainable food; tackling food poverty; building community food knowledge; promoting a sustainable food economy; transforming catering and food procurement; and reducing waste and the ecological footprint of the food system.

Business Reporter · September 2015

10

Sustainable cities

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Developing a smarter transport network: boosting capacity and improving passenger experience Upskilling a generation

L

ondon’s population is growing at an unprecedented rate. By 2031, Transport for London (TfL) has predicted that there will be an additional 1.8million people living and working in the capital, amounting to an extra Tube train full of people arriving every three days between now and then.

One of the biggest challenges of population growth will be on our transportation networks. London’s key commuter routes are already under increasing pressure during peak hours; outdated networks and Victorian-era infrastructure together with overcrowding have led to growing capacity issues. This not only affects leisure travellers and commuters, but also impacts upon our ability to do business effectively. We need to think intelligently and creatively as to how we can update and upgrade our city.

Siemens, a world leader in innovation and infrastructure is part of the solution, providing answers that help to future-proof London’s transport networks, ensuring they have the capacity and reliability to meet the needs of a booming population and keep our capital at the forefront of transport technology.

Introducing the Desiro City Class 700 Since it opened in 1988, London’s north-south Thameslink route has become a vital part of the city’s transport infrastructure. However, capacity on the route has long been an issue and passengers have been calling for upgrades for the last quarter of a century.

In response to this, the government and rail industry have developed the Thameslink programme, a multi-billion-pound project to upgrade and expand the network.

Engaged to undertake significant signalling and control works for operator Thameslink, Siemens was then commissioned in June 2013 to build 115 state-of-the-art trains as part of the project, and as a result is playing a key role in tackling the issue of capacity on the route. The new trains for Thameslink, the Desiro City Class 700, are the first second-generation electric commuter trains to be operated in the UK. They will start to run from spring 2016, bringing with them numerous improvements to the passenger experience and a smarter solution for the train operator and maintainer.

The first new trains will be introduced on the Bedford to Brighton Line and they will then be phased in gradually. By the end of 2018, Class 700 trains will flow in and out of central London on an expanded Thameslink network every two to three minutes at the busiest times, giving a Tube-like service of up to 24 trains per hour in each direction.

Transforming the passenger experience The Class 700 takes the technological expertise Siemens has gained from providing and maintaining trains that clock up mileage in excess of 60 million miles across the UK each year and offers a practical solution to the capacity dilemma.

With space at a premium at peak times, many of the new trains will be longer, meaning more people can travel in comfort.

The Class 700 has more luggage space and improved access for people with reduced mobility, and the carriages have been designed to be light and airy, with large doors and windows and open gangways between the carriages to ensure passengers can see and move through the train and also get on and off more easily. The cantilevered seats will create more space on the floor and are easier to clean, making maintenance of the train and its interiors much simpler.

The new trains will be climate controlled, with CO2 sensors assessing the number of people in the carriage and adjusting the fresh air flow accordingly. The clever systems don’t stop there: they extend to advanced fire

protection (which directs smoke out of carriages during an emergency), real-time updates and travel information and cuttingedge driver advisory and control and energy efficiency features. For example, the new passenger information systems are designed to receive and display real-time information about connections and travel disruption on other modes, such as London Underground.

Intelligence in the train systems will also enable monitoring stations to continually check the health of the train, predicting when maintenance may be required.

The trains will run on a newly upgraded network, with Siemens providing the European Train Control System (ETCS) and enhanced signalling control systems needed to support automatic train operation (ATO) and timetable management. In a world first, the integration of ETCS and ATO is crucial to the programme being able to achieve a 24 trains-per-hour service. This increase in train capacity and frequency, combined with the significant redevelopment of London Bridge, Blackfriars and Farringdon, where Thameslink will connect with Crossrail, will allow for an increase in services and provide passengers with a better commuting experience.

Thousands of jobs have already been created as a result of the Thameslink programme, including up to 2,000 across the UK supply chain in component manufacturing, assembly, construction of new depots and subsequent maintenance. This is creating a legacy of future rail skills that will help the UK compete on a global scale.

However, the National Skills Academy for Railway Engineering (NSARE) has forecast a skills shortage of more than 10,000 jobs over the next 10 years, specifically in traction and rolling stock. This is exacerbated further by the smart new technologies that are becoming prevalent in the rail industry, and is exactly why Siemens has prioritised training and development.

The government has recently set out its ambitious target to create more than 30,000 apprenticeships across the rail and road industries during the lifetime of this parliament, and Siemens looks forward to providing full support and helping our rail industry get smarter.

An example of this is the newly constructed National Training Academy for Rail (NTAR), due to open in the autumn.

Siemens is working with NSARE, the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills and the Department for Transport to create a training centre that will act as a national “hub” for rail engineering excellence in traction and rolling stock. NTAR will provide the much needed training in cutting-edge technology that will help the next generation develop smarter and more efficient transport networks in the future.

The future of commuting The first Class 700 has already arrived at Siemens’ purpose-built Three Bridges train care facility near Crawley, where it continues to undergo testing ahead of its launch next year.

Developing intelligent transport solutions such as the Class 700, and its integration with state-of-the-art signalling and control solutions, is at the heart of building and sustaining smart cities that can meet the needs of our growing population.

Without the transport technology in place, and the workforce properly skilled and ready to put plans into action, cities such as London risk falling behind.

020 7874 6772 info.railsystems.gb@siemens.com

Business Reporter · September 2015

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Sustainable cities

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Inspector Dogberry In the bag

By Matt Smith, web editor

This Big City Wales was the first country in

model, it will focus on single-use

http://thisbigcity.net

the UK to introduce a 5p charge

plastic bags and businesses

in 2011. The Welsh scheme is

with fewer than 250 employees

simple. It places a 5p levy on

will be exempt. In addition, the

the purchase of all single-use

UK government is developing

the Welsh scheme, last year

carrier bags irrespective of the

standards to enable an exemption

told the UK’s parliamentary

material they’re made from. No

for biodegradable bags to be

Environmental Audit Committee

retailer is exempt; consumers are

introduced at a later date. As

the charge works as a “habit

charged a minimum of 5p per bag

in Wales, the UK government

disruptor” that forces shoppers

whether packing up the weekly

to make a conscious decision

supermarket shop or bagging a

as to whether they want to use

Saturday night takeaway.

a plastic bag or not.

The proceeds of the levy are

He argued that the proposed

This award-winning multilingual blog has been running since 2009, sharing ideas and encouraging discussion about sustainable cities. Recent posts take a look at the role design plays in waste management, a digital initiative that maps immigrants’ moods in cities around the world and a Madrid man who spent 50 years building a cathedral.

To pay or not to pay. That is the

then donated to good causes. As

exemptions in England for

question. The Inspector hears

a result, the number of bags being

biodegradeable bags and for

The World Bank

that a 5p charge on single-use

used reduced in the first year of

small retailers would be less

plastic bags is being introduced

the levy between 96 per cent and

effective than a charge on all

http://blogs.worldbank. org/sustainablecities

in England this autumn. Similar

70 per cent. In the run-up to the

types of carrier bags. He said it

charges have already been

introduction of the tax in England

“gives mixed messages; for the

introduced in Wales, Northern

there have been concerns from

consumer, it is not very clear.” Dr

Ireland and Scotland. People in

some environmental groups

Poortinga is a principal researcher

the Republic of Ireland have been

that the English scheme is too

on a new project at Cardiff

paying for their plastic bags since

complicated.

University examining the effects

2002.

Last year in England, more

11

Although the charge will be broadly similar to the Welsh

than 7bn carrier bags were issued by supermarkets and

of the new charge, in a study expects retailers to donate the

called The English Plastic Bag

proceeds to good causes.

Charge and Behavioural Spillover.

For those familiar with the

the government says that far

theories behind behaviour change

too many of them ended up in

and nudge techniques, it will

landfill, littering our streets or

come as no surprise that there

endangering wildlife in our rivers.

is strong evidence a charge for

They also cost tax-payers millions

plastic bag use encourages people

of pounds to clean-up, not to

to use fewer bags. Dr Wooter

mention getting tangled up in

Poortinga of Cardiff University,

Dogberry’s legs and spoiling his

an expert in environmental

afternoon walkies.

psychology who evaluated

Twitter: @dogberryTweets

Welsh government launches groundbreaking new sustainability post

By Eleri Evans THE WELSH government is currently recruiting for an extraordinary job opportunity – a Future Generations Commissioner for Wales. The commissioner is expected to act as a guardian for the interests of future generations in Wales by promoting the goal of sustainability.

The new post is part of a legislative framework that has seen Wales become the first country in the world to put sustainable development at the heart of all government and public sector decisions by law. Government-run organisations have to consider

The World Bank’s fascinating sustainable cities blog brings urban development professionals together to think about the future of our cities, how they can become more sustainable and how that can be measured. It also has a section dedicated to

the social, economic and environmental wellbeing of Wales in every decision they make.

Making Wales a place where the government and public sector has a legal duty and commitment to sustainable development, with a consistent approach across all policy areas, is an attractive prospect, says Welsh Minister for Natural Resources, Carl Sargeant (inset, right), who has called the new law “a game changer”.

He said: “Our pioneering approach to ensuring the wellbeing of future generations in Wales has been well received the world over, with the UN recently stating ‘What Wales are doing today the world will do tomorrow’.

Rippl (Free – iOS)

This free app helps users to make sustainable lifestyle choices by providing regular tips about small changes they can make to take up green habits.

JouleBug (Free – iOS and Android)

Or take sustainability to the next level with JouleBug, which gamifies the process of saving money and the environment by completing green challenges.

“The Wellbeing of Future Generations Act will influence every aspect of the public sector in Wales, moving us towards achieving the Wales we all want to see. It places a duty on us all to work together to ensure that decisions taken today are made with future generations at their heart. We cannot keep leaving our problems for our children and grandchildren to solve.”

UN director of division for sustainable development Nikhil Seth said: “The Wales Future Generations Act captures the spirit and essence of two decades of UN work in the area of sustainable development and serves as a model for other regions and countries. We hope that what Wales is doing today the world will do tomorrow. Action, more than words, is the hope for our current and future generations.”

Sustainable development has always been at the core of Welsh government and can be traced back to the very start of Welsh devolution. Some of its

interesting statistics about the efficiency – or in some cases, inefficiency – of our settlements.

SustainAbility www.sustainability.com/ blog#.VfGNCBFVhBc For a wider look at sustainability and the technologies that could help to build a greener future, look no further than the SustainAbility blog. The titular firm advises companies on how to become more sustainable and as such there are plenty of inspiring and actionable ideas in its experts’ posts.

Still Sustainable City Blog: Rome https://sustainablerome. wordpress.com Rome has experimented with sustainable urban design for more than 2,700 years, and this blog takes a look at the Italian capital’s past, present and future in this light. Among other issues, one recent post examines the potential of projects to reverse the well-publicised deterioration of many areas of the city.

schemes that have been praised include the housing project Arbed, which has seen homes upgraded to tackle fuel poverty and climate change. On waste, Wales is leading the way with a 48 per cent household recycling rate and universal food waste collection. It was the first country in the UK to introduce a 5p charge on single-use carrier bags.

Added to that the Welsh Government’s committment to becoming a One Planet Nation that uses only its fair share of the Earth’s resources.

The new Wellbeing of Future Generations Act identifies goals for public authorities to improve the long-term well-being of Wales, including prosperity through building a lowca rbon economy a nd resilience via environmental protection and climate change adaptation. It also puts in place a “sustainable development principle” that tells organisations how to go about meeting their duty under the Act. Picture: WWF Cymru

12 · Business Reporter · September 2015

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INSIDE TRACK

Combining costeffectiveness and flexibility with strength and durability

B Making our public spaces more inclusive for everyone to enjoy C ities powered by technology, or smart cities as they have become more commonly known, are still considered by many as a futuristic concept. However, technology is being developed in the landscaping sector today which is making this vision a reality.

Our public realm is filled with items which help us with our everyday lives; bins, bollards, seating, lighting and signage to name a few. These items are crucial to our safety and wellbeing – however, imagine how much more effective they could be if they were able to adapt to our individual needs?

In collaboration with digital designer and engineer Ross Atkins, Marshalls has developed a pioneering technology which makes this a reality. Atkins had undertaken a research project where different groups of people were observed as they moved through public space and, as he was struck by how much of the design of our streets was defined by a trade-off between the needs of different people, the aim of this project became clear – to create spaces that work better for everybody and that everyone can enjoy.

The technology works

by enabling direct communication between the user and the items within the public space. A pedestrian’s smartphone, tablet device or specialist fob can be set up to communicate their specific requirements to the public realm, offering the ability to adapt each service to their needs.

Sensors inside the lighting and street furniture are able to detect when someone with the mobile device application is near and, depending on the user’s settings, will react to the needs they have requested assistance with.

Elderly or visually impaired users will be able to set an increase in surrounding lighting. This means that if they walk past a streetlamp using the intelligent street furniture technology, the bulbs will shine brighter as they approach and dim back down once they have passed.

Acting as a point of call for information, directions and assistance, monoliths are a vital part of any public space. These can now be adapted so they communicate with users – be it changing the contrast lighting on the map, reading out directions or stating a user’s current location.

Intelligent bollards can assist the blind by

communicating the name of the store or location they are passing by, so they can be confident of arriving at their destination.

The realities of an ageing and more urban population mean that we need to be developing ways to make our public spaces more inclusive; it is expected that there will be around 19 million people over the age of 65 by 2050, a staggering figure. An ageing population is a real and imminent issue for the UK and as such it is a necessity to start creating urban spaces that are aware of the special needs of all the UK’s citizens including the needs of older populations.

This technology is available right now – however, this is just the beginning of a hugely exciting time as we are only just scratching the surface of what is possible. The technology has huge potential and we intend to continue developing it to create even better public spaces in the future.

Steve Reddington (left) is street furniture commercial director at Marshalls 01422 312 000 www.marshalls.co.uk

ritain’s leading independent concrete and cement supplier, Hope Construction Materials, is helping Britain to pave the way to a sustainable future.

During Hope’s first three years in business, its products have literally formed the foundations for some of the UK’s major renewable energy projects as part of its wider commitment to sustainable development. Hope’s track record supplying concrete from its network of 150 depots to renewable projects spans a range of alternatives in power generation. Currently they include the delivery of 17,000m3 of structural concrete for the construction of a specialist biomass plant, which when complete, will generate enough electricity to meet the annual needs of up to 82,000 homes in Norfolk.

Last year Hope completed delivery of concrete for the construction of a £150m Energy from Waste project in the centre of Cardiff. More than 20,000m3 of bespoke concrete was used to create the piling, foundations and structure of the plant. This project will turn more than 350,000 tons of post-recycling waste into renewable energy each year, enough to power 50,000 homes in Cardiff.

Wind energy is a further area where Hope is playing a big part.

One of the UK’s tallest wind farms, in Aikengall, Scotland, will supply electricity to more than 42,000 homes and displace around 77,000 tons of carbon dioxide per annum. The wind farm’s foundations are built on 12,000m3 of Hope concrete.

Hope’s environmental commitment also extends deep into the heart of the business.

With full BES6001 certification for responsible sourcing, virtually all the company’s raw materials come from within the UK. Where feasible the basic constituents of Hope’s concrete are transported by rail to local depots for onward distribution, helping to reduce trucks on the roads. Hope has also developed its own range of more sustainable concretes HOPEEco® designed for an even lower environmental impact.

On the face of it cement and concrete may not seem to hold many sustainability credentials, but no other product can compete with concrete for flexibility and cost-effectiveness, strength and durability, and long-term sustainability. enquiries@ hopeconstructionmaterials.com www. hopeconstructionmaterials.com

Business Reporter · September 2015 · 13

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oftware companies are helping to develop technologies that make use of the industrial internet of things (IoT), to create cities that are smarter and more sustainable, reducing costs and improving efficiencies for everyone involved.

Nick Puntikov (below), president at First Line Software, says: “The industrial internet is one of the hottest trends for technology and software engineering companies. We are preparing ourselves and getting ready for this evolution.”

A study by Pike Research estimates that investments in smart city technology will increase to $108billion by 2020, while Navigant Research forecasts that global smart city technology revenue will grow from $8.8billion annually in 2014 to $27.5billion in 2023.

Figures from cities that have implemented the industrial IoT to improve sustainability has shown it will not only increase efficiency, but reduce costs as well.

Barcelona has saved $3.1billion a year through installing sensors in places such as public water pipes and parking meters, so they can be used more efficiently. The city has also optimised productivity for garbage truck drivers by wirelessly connecting garbage bins to monitor trash levels.

The data from the waste bins can be used to plan the best routes for rubbish collection, reducing waste management service costs.

In one of the European megalopolises, a monitoring system developed by First Line Software for a parking lot operator to help drivers find car parks has reduced search time by 50 per cent, saving time and fuel for drivers, while revenues increased by 11 per cent. Around 828 sensors were installed into the asphalt of the car park as well as 25

Building a better future: sustainability in the construction industry

U

Viva the smart city!

Barcelona shows the way for the future parking payment terminals.

However, not all cities have adopted a smart approach.

Puntikov believes the biggest issue in creating a smart city is that not everyone has the technological knowledge required to know how to make an area sustainable. There can also be a lack of cooperation between players in the marketplace on how to best create a smart city.

Puntikov says: “This gap needs to change. Some cities are excellent at putting together strong minds that understand what the city needs to become

smarter and have very good engineering support. But there are others where this does not work so well.”

What Puntikov says will be important in filling that knowledge gap will be leadership. He says: “From my perspective it is important to have a group of people, like a think tank, that really see the big picture of a smart city with a view of three, five and 10 years.”

He believes smart cities, by natural evolution, will become the agenda of every city council.

Leaders will

have no choice but to have sustainable cities on their agenda eventually.

What cities will look for, Puntikov explains, is a one-stop solution – to partner with a technology firm that can develop both the hardware and software for a system, rather than going to one company for a certain product and another for something else.Companies like First Line Software, which use technologies built on the industrial internet of things, will be in a prime position to do this. +1 (877) 737 7178 mike.medaglia@ firstlinesoftware.com

K Construction Week is home to Energy 2015. It will see a collection of renewable energy product suppliers present their latest products to the entire construction industry at this time of renewed growth in one of the UK’s most important sectors.

See industry heavyweights like Dr Peter Bonfield (chair of the government review on UK housing energy standards) and Ray Noble (Renewable Energy Association) explain how this will affect the industry in years to come, and hear how Natalie Bennett (leader of the Green party) sees the future of sustainable transport in the UK. Construction and Sustainability go hand in hand these days, and UK Construction Week has sustainability running throughout the nine constituent parts. The SCIN Gallery will be showcasing the latest sustainable materials for construction in Surfaces and Materials 2015, while house builders will take to the homebuilding stand to look at passivhaus, volumetric building and modern methods

of construction, all of which will see house building revolutionised in the next decade in the rush to build and solve our housing crisis.

Hear how the top construction firms, from Willmott Dixon, Lend Lease, Skanska, Cross Rail, TfL and Barratt Homes, are approaching this period of renewed activity with new techniques that have sustainability at their heart.

The opening address on Tuesday October 6 will be presented by John Humphrys (Radio 4’s Today Programme), with Dr Peter Hansford, the chief construction adviser to the UK government, outlining how sustainability lies at the heart of UK Construction.

UK Construction Week will be the biggest construction trade event the UK has seen in years. Taking place at the Birmingham NEC from October 6-8, the event will unite more than 600 exhibitors and 55,000 trade visitors.

For more information and free tickets please visit www. ukconstructionweek.com or follow @UK_CW on Twitter

Business Zone

14 · Business Reporter · September 2015

The future

Energy efficiency is a pressing priority for businesses

Being seen to be green is becoming a bigger priority Video special

Business Reporter talks to David Armitage of York Handmade about why handmade bricks are as enduring and attractive a product on the building market today as they have been in the past. Find out more at http://bit.ly/1P6UJPc

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lmost half of companies believe it’s more important they are seen to be environmentally friendly than it was three years ago, YouGov research for Mitie, the facilities management company, can reveal.

The survey of 1,000 businesses across the UK has found energy efficiency and sustainability to be a high priority, with 43 per cent saying its importance has increased over the past three years.

The figure is even higher among large organisations, where 58 per cent feel it’s now more important, and in the transportation and retail

sectors, where more than 50 per cent say that being seen to be green is now a greater priority.

The findings coincide with the launch of Mitie’s new energy proposition, which will help companies be more environmentally friendly by improving the energy efficiency of their buildings and ensuring they purchase their energy in the best way.

Mitie already has a strong track record in saving clients money, often by millions of pounds a year.

In the past year they’ve saved clients enough energy to power 14,000 homes, carried out thousands of energy surveys to identify savings, and secured more than £4bn of energy contracts on behalf of its clients.

According to Jo Butlin

(below), director of Mitie Energy, all businesses can benefit from taking a more strategic approach to how they buy and consume their energy.

“All companies need to ask themselves three things: are we doing the energy basics to comply with legislation, do we understand how we consume our energy, and are our buildings as energy efficient as they can be,” says Butlin.

“We deliver the end-to-end solutions our clients want, and we’re already working with more than 300 of the UK’s biggest businesses to improve their energy consumption.

We helped one financial institution save £5million a year on its energy costs, so the opportunities for efficiencies are definitely there.”

This desire to be more environmentally friendly is being driven by greater

concern for the environment, but also by the rising costs of energy that has made achieving efficiencies a necessity for many companies.

According to Butlin: “Although oil prices have fallen, businesses realise their overall energy costs are only likely to increase from here.

They have no influence over price, but they can implement efficiencies and ensure they are getting the best possible deal to negate the expected price increase.

“Right now the really forward-thinking companies are developing an energy strategy that brings together consumption, business processes and generation to give themselves a long-term competitive advantage.

That’s the only way to beat the market.” www.mitie.com/energy

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Collaboration: the bricks and mortar of the truly sustainable city C

reating a sustainable city is all about collaboration.

It is about developing a long-term vision and building a city that is both sustainable and a great place to live and work.

It’s a vision that requires leadership and collaboration at the top level. If that is achieved, then it is possible to move the whole industry forward and deliver the best results.

“The great news is that it’s happening right now,” says Adam Crossley, director of environment at Skanska UK. “We’ve worked with government and industry in developing Construction 2025 – an industrial strategy that sets bold and exciting targets over the next 10 years.

“It brings focus to what we are doing and will lead to new and innovative ways of working that will drive lower costs, faster delivery and lower emissions. It will be the bedrock on which sustainable cities are delivered.”

A new digital business New technologies are changing the nature of construction projects. Over recent years, there have been many headlines about the use of 3D printing. Now, for the first time, there is a bid to develop the world’s first commercial 3D concrete printing robot.

It’s being led by Skanska and Loughborough University, who have signed a collaboration agreement to develop the use of 3D printing in construction.

Rob Francis, Skanska’s director of innovation and business improvement, says: “We are working with a number of influential collaborators including Foster + Partners, Buchan Concrete, ABB and Lafarge Tarmac.

We have the potential to reduce the time needed to create complex elements of buildings from weeks to hours, while achieving a level of quality and efficiency which has never been seen before in construction.”

A pupil at St Werburgh’s Primary School enjoys a maths lesson

It’s just one of many examples where digital technologies are being trialled for use in construction. Other notable pilot schemes include the digital tagging and tracking of construction components – a bit like following your parcel delivery online on Amazon – to robotics, where repetitive and what can be dangerous elements of construction can be carried out in much safer factory environments.

“This digitisation is important to the development of sustainable cities”, says Crossley. “It’s not just about process, but also data. A great example of data integration is the TfL journey planner and application of Oyster cards, which can be used seamlessly on buses and the Tube. We take it for granted, but it’s massively complex and an excellent piece of digital engineering.

“It’s similar for buildings. We gather huge amounts of data that can be used to keep buildings in optimum condition, with servicing on plant and equipment happening exactly when it needs to. Over recent years, we have also seen the potential for buildings to be energy self-sufficient or even supply back to the grid. But we can’t make these things happen by ourselves, we rely on our supply chain partners too.”

Supply chain partnerships Government figures show that the construction industry contributes nearly £90billion to the UK economy, 6.7 per cent of the total. Much of this work is delivered through suppliers to the country’s main contractors.

It means that the vision at the top level needs to translate into action from the top to the bottom of the industry.

It led to the formation of the Supply Chain Sustainability School in 2012. Co-founded by Skanska, in partnership with other leading contractors, the school has developed into a free online learning resource that today has almost 10,000

The strength of partnership Transforming Bristol’s schools SINCE 2006, Skanska has provided nearly 7,500 new primary places in Bristol, improved the learning environment for some 13,600 secondary school students and created more than 300 new places for children with additional learning needs.

On each project, Skanska has worked with teachers, parents and neighbours to understand

what’s best for the school and how to make the most of each site.

Leading a multi-agency team, it used prefabricated straw bales and timber wall segments in constructing May Park Primary School.

Combined with other green initiatives, it means that today May Park is using around half the energy and water of a similarly sized UK school.

The changing face of construction THERE’S growing recognition in industry, including construction, that teams with people from a range of professional and cultural backgrounds are better to work in and achieve better results.

Paul Heather, managing director of Skanska’s London and South East building business and chair of its UK Diversity and Inclusion Forum, says: “As the construction industry emerges from recession, we have huge challenges to meet demand for new building and infrastructure projects.

“It means that we need to change our approach, creating

an industry that can develop innovative approaches to delivery – which are faster, greener and leaner. The only way that we can do that is through new ways of thinking.

We can’t keep recruiting the same people with the same backgrounds.

“There are very clear business and social reasons for why the industry needs to change. Our aim is to help lead that change, creating teams made up of people from diverse professional and cultural backgrounds with an inclusive mindset that enables everyone to reach their potential.”

members. Sharon Mungovan, a member of Skanska’s environment leadership team, says: “We were aiming for 600 members in the first year, but got 3,000.

“The industry response has been so positive that three additional online schools have since been established, focusing on infrastructure, offsite management and facilities management. The level of take-up has exceeded expectations, which shows the drive there is right across the construction industry to upskill and change how we work.”

Building for the future Construction is becoming much more of a values-led business. There is a real desire to break down the old stereotypes while encouraging more women and people from diverse professional and cultural backgrounds to enter the industry and change the way it works.

“There’s definitely a sense that things are changing,” adds Crossley. “It’s not just about the buildings and infrastructure that we build and maintain, but how we do it and how it benefits the communities in which we work.

“We’re focused on the payback to society in the broadest possible sense. Through our work we can leave a lasting physical legacy, as well as one where people have had the chance to learn new skills, been offered employment opportunities and, of course, build lasting relationships.

It’s a real win-win for everyone.”

01923 423412 www.skanska.co.uk