Highways Agency

Carbon (Ac)counting

Tony Sangwine

Lead Environmental Policy Advisor

Dean Kerwick-Chrisp

Head of Sustainable Development and Climate Change

sustainability@highways.gsi.gov.uk

Highways Agency

• Consists of 7,000km of motorways and all purpose trunk roads

• Largest government owned asset valued at over £85 Billion

• It carries one-third of all traffic and two-thirds of all freight on just 3% of all roads in England

Climate Change and the

Highways Agency

• Mitigation: reduce our contribution to the causes of climate change

Adaptation: adapts to continue to provide a robust strategic road network in a changing climate

Climate Change Mitigation and

the Highways Agency

• UK Government’s commitment to the reduction of greenhouse gases

• Highways Agency obligation to manage and contribute to reduction targets

• Business Plan 08-09 commitment to report carbon footprint

Carbon Accounting - Process

Overview“You can’t manage what you can’t

measure”

• September 2008 - Interim Advice Note 114/08 (standard) requirement for all major suppliers to report on carbon emissions associated with delivering our work

• Excel based system that asks for quantities of resources used, and calculates CO2 based on standard conversion factors

www.ha-partnernet.org/sustainability

Step 1

Establish Organisational

Boundaries

Step 2

Establish Operational

Boundaries

Step 3

Emission Sources

Step 4

Data Collection and

Calculations

Step 5

Roll-up to Organisational

Level

Carbon Accounting – What’s in?

• Construction

• Maintenance

• Operations

• Administrative

business

Carbon Accounting - Boundaries

“Reasonable control”:• Financial & Contractual

Commitments

• Includes Supply Chain

• Excludes Network Users

Core Areas of Business:

Operational, construction, maintenance, & business activities:

• HA Internal

• Network Operations

• Major Projects (£5m+)

• Managing Area Contractors

• Design-Build-Finance-Operate Schemes

Tier 1

(Final Account)

Tier 2

(Reporting Areas)

Tier 3

(Emission Categories)

Internal

Operations

Major

Projects

Network

OperationsMACs

DBFO

Contracts

Highways Agency

Carbon Account

Energy

Materials

Transport

Waste Disposal

Major

Refurbishment

Energy

Materials

Transport

Waste Disposal

Energy

Materials

Transport

Energy

Materials

Transport

Waste Disposal

Energy

Materials

Transport

Waste Disposal

Key Emission

Sources

Key Emission

Sources

Key Emission

Sources

Key Emission

Sources

Key Emission

Sources

Tier 4

(Emission Sources)

Climate Change - Emissions

SourcesEnergy

Materials

Transport

Waste

Electricity

Gas

Operational Plant

Business Travel

Cars

Air

Public

Transport

Staff Commuting

Metals

Mortars

Quarried Materials

Plastics

Concrete

Disposal

Transportation

Highways Agency –

Carbon footprint 2008-09

• In region of 550,000

tonnes/CO2 associated with:

• Major construction

• Maintenance and improvement

• HA office and business travel

• Network energy consumption

Published in our annual report for

the first time

Mitigation: CO2 reductions -

Midnight switch off

• At current energy rates the project is expected to pay for itself within four years

• No evidence of an increase in accident rates. Evidence has suggested the accident rate may have dropped while the sites have been active.

• The site selection of additional Phase 2 deployment has begun, which will probably increase the anticipated 400 tonnes of CO2 savings already expected by the end of this year.

Mitigation - manage traffic

flows to reduce congestion

• Enhance capacity where necessary

• Use technology to help traffic flow more smoothly

• Deploy demand management measures:

- High Occupancy lanes

- Ramp Metering

- Travel Plans

• Influence land use development

Mitigation: better information

to improve user decisions

• Most road traffic decisions made by users & CO2 produced from users actions

• Better information about options and route condition

• Internet tools

• Traffic Radio

• Telephone enquiry

• On route electronic message signs

Day After Tomorrow…

• Business Plan targets 2009-10

• Reduce emissions from main HA offices and administrative business travel

• Reduce emissions from energy supply for network lighting

• Factor climatic changes into standards and specifications

• Apply procurement strategy