Our impact
Annual impact measurement
Little Blue Research recognises that it has a responsibility to the environment beyond legal and regulatory requirements. We are committed to reducing our environmental impact and continually improving our environmental performance as an integral part of our business strategy and operating methods, with regular review points. We will encourage customers, suppliers and other stakeholders to do the same.
To identify, understand and address Little Blue Research’s environmental impact, we assessed the company’s carbon emissions, waste production, water use and material consumption generated by our main activities between March 2022 to February 2023. Of these issues, only carbon emissions were identified to be material to the company's operations.
To identify, understand and address Little Blue Research’s green house gas emissions (GHGs), we annually assess emissions generated by our main activities, and calculate a total annual carbon footprint.
Using guidance from the Carbon Trust’s Carbon Footprint Guide and the Defra 2022 Emission Conversion Factors, the CO2e emissions within scope 1 and 2 of the guide have been calculated, as well as some from scope 3.
The calculations assist in estimating the company’s largest emissions sources, allowing targeted sustainability practices to be carried out.
New for this year
At Little Blue Research, we are committed to continually improving our environmental impact by changing the way we work and how we operate. In 2023 we have:
-
developed a set of procurement criteria and thresholds for use in our company environment policy
-
started to include sustainability commitments in our proposals, as well as the offer of an estimated carbon footprint on our project work
-
streamlined our website to reduce the carbon emissions generated from unnecessary pages.
Total emissions = 5.5tCO2e
Little Blue Research donated £150 to the Woodland Trust to help them care for enough woodland to capture and store approximately 6tCO2e (Woodland Trust, 2022).
Notes:
-
Office & household energy assumes average UK peak (daytime) energy consumption per capita;
-
Defra emissions factors for standard electricity consumption have been used for home and office;
-
Appliances currently excludes peripheral devices e.g., mice, keyboards and monitors;
-
The most common commuter journeys for each team member have been used for each workplace;
-
As no medium or long-distance business travel (business travel outside of London) was conducted in 2022, emissions from Business travel (land and air) were not calculated for 2022.
-
Find out more about the Woodland Trust here
What we're doing to reduce our impact
Office & household energy
We rent office space from Work.Life, a B Corp certified company which uses 100% renewable electricity providers¹.
Appliances
We plan on repairing our devices where possible instead of buying new devices, and recycling anything we can after repairing is no longer viable.
We reduce vampire energy consumption by encouraging employees to unplug devices and remove them from charge when not in use or at full battery.
Commute
We support flexible working arrangements enabling employees to work remotely part time.
Data storage
We reduce unnecessary data storage.
We use Microsoft cloud servers to store our data, reducing emissions by up to 98% compared to traditional on-site solutions².
Website
Our site uses minimal animation, and includes no video-player to limit data transferred.
We are limiting the number of back-up sites that we have, and ensuring that content on our site is streamlined.
Paper & print
We only print paper where necessary, using FSC certified paper if available.
Procurement
We have procurement criteria and thresholds for use in our company environment policy.
Customers
We include sustainability commitments in our proposals and the offer of an estimated carbon footprint on our project work.
² The carbon benefits of cloud computing (2018)
