Sustainability Assessment Questions: Understanding Your Footprint

Although there are robust and technical environmental audits, often small companies don’t necessarily need such detail to understand their environmental impacts. Smaller companies can conduct sustainability assessments that are more geared to their business. Assessments not only review the footprint of organization operations but will also identify opportunities to improve environmental stewardship, save money, improve productivity and increase customer and employee loyalty.

To conduct your own sustainability assessment, reach out to each department or division of a company and hold informational interviews. Although more information can be gathered through in-person meetings, an organization can also conduct an assessment via an online survey. Develop a series of questions that ask specifically what each area is doing to reduce resource use and minimize environmental impact.  Some organizations also like to assess the social side of business and determine how employees are engaged in the community and the non-profit organizations they support.

Here are is a list of some sample questions to ask by each sustainability topic area:

Waste Management: Is recycling provided as an option? If so, what percentage of the employees participates in office recycling?

Suppliers and Purchasing: Are office supplies purchased made from post-consumer recycled material? How many of your vendors are local suppliers? Has your purchasing department developed in guidelines that take into account green businesses practices?

Paper Reduction: What paper reduction policies and/or practices has the company done? Is the company’s marketing giveaways made from recycled material and/or recyclable?

Energy Conservation: How has your company tried to reduce energy? Do you own any energy star equipment? Does staff turn off equipment in the evenings?

Water Conservation: How has your company tried to reduce water? What water saving devices are installed in your facilities?

Toxins and Chemicals: What types of cleaning chemicals are used in your office? Is there any toxic or hazardous material located at the facilities?

Transportation: If you have a transportation fleet, what measures have you taken to reduce driving?

Employees: Does the company have any communications educating employees about conservation of resources?

Philanthropy: How does your company contribute to the community? Donations? Volunteer programs?

Meat Impacts on the Environment

Eating meat has a large footprint on the earth. Here are some facts;

• Reducing meat production by 10% in the US would free enough grain to feed 60 million people. (Harvard Nutritionist, Jean Mayer)
• According to the USDA, growing crops for animal feed requires 80% of U.S. agricultural land and nearly half of the water supply. (USDA)
• More than 80 pounds of CO2 are released for every 2.2 lbs of meat consumed.
• Factory farms are responsible for 18% of green house gases worldwide. They are also the cause of 64% of ammonia emissions, the primary cause of acid rain.(Natural Home Magazine)

Although eating less meat overall will reduce CO2 emissions and help the environment, it is also important to know which meat or protein is better than others. E Magazine published an article, The Best Meat to Eat, which identifies chicken and turkey as two of the meats lower in GHG emissions. Lamb, beef and pork were rated higher in their environmental footprint.

If you would like to learn more about vegetarian and meat free diets, here are some good resources;

Vegetarian Times: They produce a monthly publication and a great source of vegetarian recipes.

Food Revolution: John Robbins, the heir to the Baskin Robbins empire is also a vegetarian and author of Diet for A New America.

Becoming a Vegetarian: A blog for those individuals and families who want to start transitioning off of meat-based diets.

Calculate Your Impact and Footprint

There are a host of calculators out there to help you or your office determine your impact. Once your impact is known then create a goal of how you would like to reduce it. Here are a few of my favorites to get you started:

Global Footprint Network: A good overall calculator on general green footprint

Household Savings Calculator: Developed by the NRDC to track home energy savings

Water Calculator: Developed by H2O Conserve this measures water consumption.

Xerox Sustainability Calculator: A great calculator that measures the overall  impact a company’s printers and copiers have on the environment.

United Airlines Offers Carbon Calculator to offset Travel Footprint

United has jumped on the carbon offset bandwagon and worked with Sustainable Travel International to develop a carbon calculator that is customized to traveler’s itinerary. The calculator takes into account the carbon footprint that results from each flight also taking into account load factors and fuel usage. The calculator will suggest a tax deductible carbon offset donation that United will process.