Marlborough Highways is on the road to a greener future, with a sustainability strategy that sets out ambitious targets to become Carbon Neutral by 2025 ahead of the UK Government’s deadline of 2050.
Marlborough’s carbon footprint was assessed to understand what changes needed to be made to the company’s direct emissions which include LPG, fleet vehicle fuel and diesel consumption as well as electricity generation.
The effects of climate change have accelerated over the past two decades. The chemical composition of the atmosphere has altered, generating a build-up of greenhouse gases – primarily carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide levels – raising the average global temperature.
As well as offsetting unavoidable emissions, Marlborough is strongly committed to the Waste Hierarchy, Prevent, Reduce, Re-use, Recycle and Recover to help play its part in reducing greenhouse gas emissions for a greener future.
As a highway services business, offering surfacing, traffic management, road markings, civil engineering and highway maintenance products and solutions, certain emissions cannot be eliminated due to the nature of Marlborough’s operations which is why offsetting carbon emissions forms a part of the business’s strategy.
Marlborough has chosen to support a Solar Energy power plant overseas as an equivalent carbon dioxide reduction. The total capacity of the project is 480MW and will reduce emissions by up to 850,000 tonnes of CO2e every year.
The Solar Energy project directly contributes towards the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. The investment will help to provide electricity to those without, support the expansion of infrastructure, provide sustained economic growth, encourage entrepreneurship and job creation and support technological progress to find lasting solutions to both economic and environmental challenges.
Marlborough has made two new appointments in the last six months to support the business’s long-term goals toward carbon neutrality: Head of Performance, Sustainability and Social Values, Nick Reading, and Environment and Sustainability Officer Fiona Cummings.
Matthew Revell, Managing Director commented “I believe that putting the right people in place to support our Carbon Neutral strategy will be key to our success. We’re reducing our carbon footprint as much as possible and where we can’t, we’re offsetting, making a real difference overseas while supporting the United Nations Sustainability Goals.”