You can listen to Episode S3E7 right here!
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Hello, and welcome to the Third Age Design podcast sharing essential information on senior environments. I’m Lori Pinkerton-Rolet. The late American folk singer and social activist Pete Seeger said, If it can’t be reduced, reused, repaired, rebuilt, refurbished, refinished, resold, recycled or composted, then we should be restricting, redesigning, or removing it from production. Here at Third Age Design, we share with you essential information which can positively impact senior living environments, such as today’s topic of sustainability, in which we will look at redesign, among other things. If you haven’t already done so why not go to our website at ThirdAge.Design and hit the ‘Join Us’ button, you’ll automatically receive this quarters ‘A TAD Extra’, which is exclusive information for our community members. Plus, like many of life’s most valuable aspects, it’s entirely free. The Third Age Design podcast is supported by Innova Care Concepts whose mission is to enhance quality of life through innovation. From hydrotherapy pools to furniture, you’ll find quality, aesthetics, and functionality in all unique Innova products. Innova Care Concepts…the leading edge of health care. Okay, let’s get started. It’s not easy. being green. Let’s get our ducks in a row or in this instance, are frogs in a row to start. What do we mean by sustainability? And what is meant by green design? And are they the same thing? Here’s some quick definitions to get us started. In 1987, a United Nations Commission defined sustainability as, “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Meanwhile, the NBS, or national building specification here in the UK, defines green design as ‘creation of buildings which are energy efficient, healthy, comfortable, flexible in use, and designed for long life’. And I love this bit…’a design approach focused on resource efficiency and minimum environmental impact is not incompatible with visual delight.’ Isn’t that a great term visual delight. So in summary, I interpret these definitions as sustainability having to do with future generations and resources, and green being related to what we can do now. But let’s see what the expert says. My guest today is Danny sharp, co-founder and Director of North Star projects, the only consultancy in the United Kingdom to offer architecture, town planning, and project management services solely to the elderly care sector. Northstar works on behalf of care home operators and developers from initial sketch design and planning, right through tenders and project management, building on the process on behalf of care home operators, and they also know a thing or two about sustainability. Danny is an award- winning architect who in 2022, won the best architectural design award at the Pinder’s Health Care Design Awards, which is really the big one in the UK, and his new home for pilgrims friends society won the inaugural Care Home Design of the Year at the National Care Awards the same year. Welcome to the Third Age design podcast Danny
Danny Sharpe
Thank you very much, good to be here.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Now, I’d like to begin by asking you, does Northstar distinguish between the ideas of sustainability and green design? Are they two separate things? Are they the same thing? How do you differentiate?
Danny Sharpe
Yes, so sustainability is really the umbrella term which covers economic, social and environmental factors for short, and people places and profit if you like. So, whereas that’s the overarching term of green design is focused really on the environmental subset as part of that. So for example, good sustainable design would ensure that it from a care home point of view would ensure the buildings located near to centres of population so that future staff and residents can can easily access to development, ideally on foot or via accessible public transport…
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
…or bicycles or some some other form of transport.
Danny Sharpe
But if a building is also environmental friendly. So it incorporates recycling. it minimises the use of natural resources and so on, then it could also have been said to be green.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
So green isn’t about profit, as you were saying before, how would you define if you will green design?
Danny Sharpe
Yeah, so we’re saying was that sustainability is really the umbrella term. So sustainability covers everything, economic, social, environmental factors. Green design is a subset of that. So the environmental subset, if you like, is is about green design. So whereas if we were to site a building near to centres of a population so that future staff can can get their residents can get there, either on foot or via public transport. That’s that that would that would, to me be sustainable, because you’re thinking about the economy, you’re thinking about where the people come from, how you benefit society, all those those grander, bigger themes if the building is also in a smaller way. environmentally friendly, so if it if it has encourages local local habitats, local wildlife, uses local flora and fauna in its design, if it’s incorporates recycling minimises then we’d set up buildings a green building, sitting within the under the umbrella of the wider sustainability package.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
So sustainable materials, in other words would be green, but then that would sit under the sustainability umbrella. Yeah. Now I know. And you heard in the introduction I gave to you that you work solely in what you refer to as the elderly care sector. And I’m just wondering if you ever get any pushback on this term, simply because I know I’ve been in meetings where even operators have said to their residents, they’ve called them old people. And people generally don’t like that term. They don’t like being called old. And I’m just questioning about elderly.
Yeah, I did once I wrote an article, it’s one of my old professors at Newcastle University actually picked me up on it, I’d written an article about the need for greater advocacy and planning for developments incorporating housing and care within local planning frameworks. I was arguing the need for a new use class to benefit extra care accommodation and housing for the elderly. And suggesting there should be allocations within local plans, maybe for single storey housing assisted living, but but general age related or assisted living accommodation generally. And I got into all sorts of nuances with with an argument an old professor picked out from that was the fact that I called it elderly care. So I don’t really care about semantics. I think it is semantics. It’s nitpicking sometimes. There are big issues at stake here. And I don’t get precious about out..call it whatever you want me to call, right. When I think about it, honestly, the work that we do is no more than 90% is elderly, and focused on the care part of our rate. So I stand by it but I’m not overly precious about it.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
And why did you decide Danny to take your company, you know, virtually solely into that sector? What were the deciding factors for you personally?
Danny Sharpe
Years ago, I was the Director of quite a large national, UK architecture practice. And we worked on all sorts of government rollout programmes, PFI initiatives for new schools, new hospitals, the amount of research and development that went into those projects was incredible. There was so much guidance, so is sharing of best practice, reams of technical advisory notes. But, we also did a small amount of care or elderly care. And this was pushed off to an old guy in the corner of the office. And he would turn out his L shaped design, his ‘H’ shaped design…. is he is we’ve all seen it…no thought given to the aesthetics, the functionality of the building. And it just got me thinking, you know, it’s everything else gets so much attention, so much research and development, that this really wasn’t it was a missed opportunity. So Ewen and I both work together that that practice. And then shortly after we’d set up Northstar, we met with the consultant psychiatrists from Bournemouth and Poole hospitals. They had been brought into a new company to deliver a specialist type of dementia care in the south of England. So we were brought into that, that group and we all started…
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Which consultant was that that was working with the dementia care?
Danny Sharpe
It was the two consultant psychiatrists one from Bournemouth hospital, one from Poole hospital, and they were brought in by it was a private sector company that had been set up a special purpose vehicle company that had been set up to develop a brand new type of dementia care home. And they brought us in as the as the experts to come and design it alongside them. We all learned together we did all the studying best practice. We looked at the whole-of-life model in the Netherlands. We looked at what’s happening in the USA and looked at what’s happening in Australia. And that’s really where the whole thing started for us. So we started from a very specialist. Yes, dementia care facility. And we’ve been on that journey for 16 years or more now, just trying to improve that every every step of the way.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
So quite quite research-based. And you know, that’s why the podcast exists to again, try to foster new ways of thinking keep up to date on what is happening in terms of research and new directions, specifically, from around the world as a hub. Now, I read your article in ‘Care Management Matters’ magazine. And there was a very broad range of viewpoints that you use to approach your topic of this kind of work, which relates to international and UK Government carbon emission targets, standards, investor appeal, which I think is a really interesting one that you you raise, and indeed refurbishment products and projects. I’d like to break some of these down a little bit. And using the UK as the basis for the first example, let’s start with new standards. So the UK using that that country as a as an example, it’s announced a zero, net zero carbon emissions target for 2050 with a 68% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030. And you have to compare that to something so that 68% reduction is based on 1990 levels as the starting point. So in building specifically care facilities, Danny, what are some of the strategies, which developers architects, M & E consultants in particular might actually consider that are going to help get us there?
Danny Sharpe
Yeah. Okay, so the first thing then is to examine the carbon emissions involved in the lifecycle stages of the construction of the proposed building. So that includes the building materials, the transport involved in getting those materials to the building site, the impact of the actual construction process itself. The assessment will then go on to say, looking at carbon emissions during the lifecycle of the of the buildings operational use. So what’s going to need replacing during that 100 year lifespan of the building was going to need refurbishing? Eventually, the deconstruction of the building, you’re going to demolish it at some point in the future. All of these are referred to as the embedded carbon impacts within that whole construction process. So once you have a feeling for or you’ve you’ve plotted a route through all that to select, where you find the best materials, the next stage is then thermal modelling the building. So how efficient is the building, retaining its heat in the winter and staying cool in the summer? Okay. The engineers cost of fabric-first approach. So the greater the thermal mass of the building, the more we can reduce the demand for energy of any kind, renewable or fossil fuel based. So if we can reduce the energy it’s using to either heat or cool the building. That’s got to be a benefit. The next stage then, obviously, is to look at how do we reduce the use of non renewable fossil fuel based energy in favour of renewable energy. So depending on the the orientation of the site, the configuration of the building, we could look at installing solar photovoltaics, for example, to generate electricity, we could instal air source heat pumps or ground source heat pumps to heat the building. If the scheme is part of a larger development, we could benefit from wind energy community heating systems, district heating systems and so on to provide the heat and hot water.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Are you finding that that Planning Officers are really interested in this aspect?
Danny Sharpe
I think they have been for quite a long time, but it’s been almost a tick box mentality for them. And you know, going back 15 years or more, I can remember being required to produce 15% renewable energy on a scheme. I don’t see that there’s a huge amount of thought that goes into that policy other than to say hermetic, the bottom, certainly at that time, used to be we’d specify a couple of solar photovoltaic panels, perhaps an air source heat pump, and that’s it done. And they’re happy, we’re happy. I do think now there are certain authorities we’re building in Bristol at the moment and Bristol are very keen on renewable energy, and they push it a green agenda. So the home that I’ve designed in Bristol, which has been built now is being built to the highest level of rating by BREAAM, which is an excellent rating, in that that level of renewable and sustainable energy. So that’s good. You know, and I think you’re seeing it more and more now that it’s more and more being taken seriously. But I think for a long time, it was really just a tick box exercise. Right. But I think now, you know, we’re we’re also doing things now we’re thinking about the aspect of the building so that Bristol is a good example where the day rooms are orientated to the south of the West. So we maximise the sunlight and daylight in their bedrooms and the back of house more to the north and west of the site. So it’s a case of using solar energy where you can that just the sun’s rays and daylight, also being mindful to avoid overheating because of climate change. And so we use what’s called low G value glazing to limit the solar gain that gets into the building.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Right. So you don’t have to add AC on to take it up to take away the heat. Right?
Danny Sharpe
Yeah, yeah.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
You mentioned sort of a full lifecycle of the building earlier. And I’m just wondering, in terms of what we as designers, and architects, M & E, consultants, etc, are putting into buildings right now, can you think of any examples of what you think will be coming up in the fairly short term of those elements that might require retrofitting as we as we get greener and more sustainable?
Danny Sharpe
If you look at Bristol, for example, there won’t be any retrofitting there, because we’ve been pushed from day one, by the council to come up with the highest level of renewable energy standards that we can. I think it depends who’s building. So the care market is quite unique, as you know, where certainly in the UK, where a lot of the building stock is owned by a very disparate group of people. So So owners with one, two or three care homes, it’s not dominated by hue, huge landlords, there are they do have a certain part of the market, but it’s quite a small share of the market. So it’s easier for institutional investors to take a long term view and saying, We’ll invest upfront in all these new technologies, which are more expensive, there’s, there’s no easy way around that. Yeah. But they know that they’ve got that longer payback period. So typically, an institutional lease will be 35 years plus on a pension fund. So they can take a longer term view, knowing that payback might be at year 10, year 20, or whatever it might be. If you’re, you know, equal, the mom and pop operation where you’ve got one or two care homes, it’s much harder than you might not own the building for more than one life cycle, seven years. So it’s much harder for them to, to put these things in. So I think there will be retrofitting and future I see schemes coming up every day. That will need that. But I sort of understand that as well, depending on who the person is, who’s developing the scheme,
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
The cost things. But in terms of the longevity of the scheme, if people were to invest in greener things, are there any specific and direct advantages to residents that live in greener environments that one can sell? Basically?
Danny Sharpe
Yeah, the upfront cost is what Bill Gates his recent book, How to avoid a climate disaster talks about it costs about the green premium. So that’s the difference between the cost of carbon emitting processes and zero carbon alternatives. So I said before, it’s much more expensive initially to put an air source heat pump in as opposed to a gas boiler. But after seven or eight years, you’ll start to see the payback with that. So it’s cheaper in the long run, because it’ll have lower running costs. Solar panels are different, it might take 17 or 18 years for them to start paying back. So yeah, it is difficult for investors, I think there are more people taking into account now. And as you said before, 2030 is not that far away. So we really need to be getting these things done now. I think there are advantages to living in a greener building. natural ventilation gardens that benefit from native species encourage local wildlife. The buildings will be cooler in the summer, there’ll be warmer in the winter. They’ll have drainage systems so that they don’t have any flooding in the gardens. They’ll enjoy uniform heating rather than having pockets of heat from radiators and so on, or pockets of cold in rooms. So it is a nicer environment to live in. But as we say it’s the payback time and the period I think very much depends on who the developer is and who the operator is for that facility.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
What is the lifespan of solar panels in general?
Danny Sharpe
I think it depends on it. productivity. I mean, like all things, you know, you can, you can buy cheap, buy expensive, I think the very best will last a long time. And it’s about investing. And so this is where it comes back to the start of the conversation where we talked about things that may need replacing with the lifespan of the building, you have to factor that in. It’s also, you know, we’re talking about these things as, as being either or so they were probably going to come on to this maybe a bit later. But it’s not as simple as saying it’s either renewable energy, or it’s, it’s fossil fuel energy. You know, for example, to build a set of solar of photovoltaic panels, the steel frame that they sit in, has to be has to be manufactured. And that’s typically manufactured from steel, steel is one of the worst carbon emitters. Creation of steel is one of the worst carbon emitters on the planet. So, and wind farms, you know, the huge steel column in a wind farm are the carbon fibre blades of a wind farm window. They all need to be created initially. So the upfront, it’s not just the upfront monetary cost of these things. It’s also quite often the upfront carbon emission cost of these things to create them in the first place.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
And to get in here because isn’t most of the steel coming out of China at the moment, the majority of the world’s steel, so you’ve got that footprint too, in order to get your frame on your roof. Get your photovoltaic panels up.
Danny Sharpe
Yeah, and there’s a terrifying statistic, which is that not so much in terms of steel, but but in cement, which is the other steel and cement the other two graders carbon emitters you have in terms of materials. China used more cement between 2011 and 2013, than the USA did for the whole of the 20th century. It is literally humbling when you look at the 20th century was the century of the skyscraper. So it Chicago is it’s New York. And to think that China use more cement, it knows that period, 2011 to 2013 than the whole of the 20th century in America. The problem is huge. I mean, you can see the scale of the problem. I did some work in China, or 10 years ago or more now. And we were driving across a bridge in southern China. And it was at a time it was even slightly more than 10 years ago, David Cameron had just had a little windmill fitted to the roof of his Notting Hill townhouse. We were driving across this bridge in Guan, Jo. And there were skyscrapers as far as I could see, all blazing with light. And I was thinking that windmill is really not going to cut it.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
That’s funny. I mean, there’s so much apparently sort of 40% I’ve read of the wasted sort of resources on the planet come from construction. So it’s clear we need to, we need to get a hold of ourselves and move this forward. But there’s certain things that at the moment, there aren’t other methods of achieving. So plastic piping is used everywhere coated wires are used everywhere concrete, as you said, interiors from my side of things were using, you know, we can specify non toxic paints, but then there tends to be issues with durability, and specifically in the care of fat in the care sector. That’s a that’s a very big issue. Many of the operators are still asking for non slip vinyl flooring, which is a plastic product. And the UK being amongst the worst in the in the world in terms of fire safety requirements, we just chuck toxic chemicals on things in order to keep them from igniting. So surely none of these materials are environmentally sustainable fabrics or not. In order to make a white cotton you need bleach and a ton of water. So as a specific sector, how can we collectively, architects, designers, M & E consultants, clients, how can we collectively move forward towards a green and more sustainable environment in the future?
Danny Sharpe
We have to get past this saying earlier, this either or debate is either renewable or its fossil fuel energy. I think we have to understand that we’re in a transition period now. And we have to be more nuanced and we have to we can’t just switch up our reliance on fossil fuels and say that’s it overnight. We’re going to stop now. So for example, I bought a I’ve had hybrid cars for the last I don’t know how many years and I finally this year, bought an all electric car. I was feeling pretty smug about it until I then realised how the emissions that are creating that car mean that I’ll have to drive it at least 20,000 miles before it’s, it’s greener than a typical petrol or diesel car that I could have bought the same time. So when you when you realise that the rest of it to build that car. So when you realise that, again, it’s about, it’s about payback times monetary and environmentally. But it’s also understanding that there’s going to be some pain as we make this transition. And we have to move from one to the other, but it’s not going to be overnight. So it’s about innovation and investment. So if we choose in huge numbers to commit to low carbon, renewable energy and a greener lifestyle, then we will start to address the problems of global warming, that co2 emissions, of course, but it will take large scale investment by global corporations, national governments, to affect the rate of change, and to make innovation worthwhile. You know, government is one of the greatest purchasers of of stuff. So, you know, if governments decide to invest in new renewable energy types, new battery storage is going to be crucial to all of this fuel storage. If government starts to invest in these things, innovation is there. I mean, we’ve proven throughout the innovation will come if the investment is there to drive it, ironically, and I say it’s not, it’s not either or so we need, we need to understand that we’re on a pathway now, and what different parts of the world are clearly going to move at different rates. But as part of that, and ironically, maybe I shouldn’t be saying this, but we should be doing more to reuse the buildings that we have now. So one of the things you can do is to convert or adapt or remodel your existing care home. Because it’s it’s your starting, it’s so much further down the line, in terms of particularly the the embedded carbon emissions in the construction of that building. And it’s the same with cars, we should be driving our cars for longer, we should be using our buildings for longer, we should be using them in a smarter way. So that a care home which is deemed to be for example, we looked at one recently for West Berkshire Council, it had no ensuite bathrooms at all, we went in there to say, by knocking two rooms into one in parts by increasing certain other bills, we can retrofit bathroom pods into these things, and give the building another 10 or 20 years worth of life. It’s not huge, but it’ll if we did that across the board and across a whole load of care homes rather than just simply demolish them and start again, then that would have a huge impact too. So you shouldn’t be saying that, but it’s true.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
You know, and I mean, we do them. I’m sure you do as well we do we do retrofit buildings, it’s it’s sometimes isn’t less expensive. It can be as expensive. In my experience. It does go back to one of your original points, Danny, which was you know, it’s looking at the full cycle of what is possible out of that building and the materials and the air miles or whatever that have gone into producing it in the first place. Yeah. So that’s you’ve really given some very interesting insights today. And I and I know a lot of our listeners will be quite inspired. I just want to thank you very, very much for for joining us today and adding your your voice to a very important topic.
Danny Sharpe
That was my it was my pleasure. Thanks very much.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
And you’ll find direct links to some of the areas we’ve been discussing on the podcast page for this episode at ThirdAge.Design. In today’s ‘Innovation Spotlight’, I’m speaking with Tom Hulbert Managing Director of the Third Age Design, podcast sponsor-Innova Care Concepts, and to prove that there’s no conflict of interest in our impartiality here at TAD. We’re not speaking to Tom about his fantastic product line or services, but rather on the topic of today’s episode… sustainability. Tom, thank you for joining me on the podcast.
Tom Hulbert
Thank you, Lori, very glad to be your guest.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Now Innova is an integrated part of the supply chain for goods related to care environments. And your website has one of the most thorough and substantiated sustainability policies that I’ve ever seen. So I’d like to start with when you developed your policy and why you’ve gone to that full extent?
Tom Hulbert
Yeah, thank you, Lori. It was I suppose it goes back to end of 2021 when we did a review of where we were as a group and what we wanted to do in 2022 moving forward, and I think we recognise that sustainability was obviously an is obviously a very important and topical subject, I think if we, you know, you go back to, I suppose, well before my time, but in, say the 70s, I suppose it was a big and rightly so a big push at that point in business on health and safety and that type of thing, and that legislation that comes in, and now where we are today, there’s this realisation, if you like in the world, and more and more so that we have to change in terms of sustainability as we move forward. So, if we look back over the last 20 years, I suppose particularly 25 years, there’s been such a globalisation in supply chains that actually haven’t been sustainable. It’s been so much easier to deal with suppliers all over the world, because travel is maybe cheaper and easier. And the ability to do business in different languages and currencies. And everything’s been speeded up, I suppose, with the whole internet of things. But actually, I think there’s a realisation now that a lot of that is not sustainable, because it’s not going to give a sustainable planet moving forward. So to answer your question, I think early 2022, what we’re beginning to see was number one more interest in, you know, as we’re doing tenders and things and some scoring and that type of thing, being related to sustainability, not just, you know, product, quality price, service levels, that type of thing, but also sustainability being brought in there. And so much so that we had one, government based tender that we wanted to go for a framework that actually stipulated that we had to have or companies have to have a carbon Net Zero roadmap. So that’s where it came from. We were also very aware of many of our customers goals and targets and everything that they’re setting in their boards and the way they run their organisations that sustainability is a big part of what they need to do going forward. So we recognise that we needed to do something ourselves in order to make sure that we can support them in that journey going forward.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Right. So part of it was was commercial, but part of it was also internal in terms of the direction of things, if you will, so what you were just speaking about, that you needed in order to get into this framework? Is that the carbon foot print report that’s on your website? Because that it has a breakdown of emissions reduction targets, calculations, specific projects. I mean, why did you feel it necessary to share that entire level of detail on the website?
Tom Hulbert
Yes, that’s a good question, Lori, I think one of the main reasons is because we wanted to be completely transparent and open with all of our stakeholders, from customers, to our suppliers, and everyone to show that we’re serious about this, we’re passionate and want to make a difference in sustainability and how sustainability affects our, our industry and our supply chain moving forward. So we felt it’s very easy to almost, you know, have an off the shelf sustainability, environmental policy, these kinds of things. And actually, they’re completely meaningless. Unless you actually, you know, measure where we are today. And say, this is where we want to be in the future and have some targets in place. In other words, if you don’t measure it, you can’t manage it. And that was one of the big reasons we wanted to share all the information to say, this is where we are today. We don’t think it’s terrible. It’s a lot better than you know, then maybe it could have been if we paid taking different decisions a while back, but it’s no way is it where we want to be. We want to be much better than we were then.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Right and some of these off the shelf versions are basically tick box exercises to say we’ve done this we’ve done that what we’ve done the other but not necessarily setting targets and then objectively reviewing them on an annual basis. So could you share with our listeners some of the targets that Innova Care Concepts is has set?
Tom Hulbert
Yeah, very good. So for our listeners, home should All lots will know this. But in the greenhouse gases, carbon emissions, they talk about three scopes. Scope, one, two and three scope one being direct emissions resulting from things that we are doing in the business. So for example, if we’re doing some manufacturing, and we’re creating emissions off that, then that’s part of that, you know, our vehicles and things like that, sort of our footprint, as we’re going around or in our daily daily work, then scope to you’ve got indirect emissions, which is, when we’re using electricity. In our organisation, you know, which we’ve got some huge warehouses, for example, you know, you’ve got all your lighting and that type of thing. The carbon emissions aren’t actually created on site, when you lose the electricity, there’s not carbon emissions produced at that point, but there is when when electricity is produced, so it’s measuring that in scope two, and then scope three. And this is sometimes one of the more challenging areas to measure is activities that are created because of what our organisation is doing, but by other parties. So might be up our supply chain, or down our supply chain as we’re delivering goods and that type of thing. So what we’ve, to come back to your question about targets, we’ve committed to a reduction of our scope one and two emissions by 42%, across our group of companies, by 2030, whichever is the equivalent of 378 tonnes of co2 equivalent per year from the current operation from right now, from from that was actually from 2020, to when we write our roadmap in place. And then scope three emissions, which is a slightly more challenging one, because you don’t have direct control over a lot of those organisations, although you can do a lot more due diligence and working with the supply partners for it. But we’ve got a target to reduce that by 274 tonnes of co2 equivalent, which is 63% reduction by 2035. So we’re saying 2030 for scope one, and two, and 2035 to be net zero on scope three, which is very ambitious. I think 2050 is set out as the ultimate goal on like, for overall. Exactly. So we wanted to really challenge ourselves on that.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
And have you found as you’ve been going along, because I think you were saying you sort of started this in 2021? Have you found any specific successes that you could share with us that might be inspirational for the listeners?
Tom Hulbert
Yeah, very good, I think the the area that will have the biggest impact as we move forward and grow the business has got to be in scope three. And the way that we’re doing that is by actively engaging with our supply chain, to share with them what our net zero plans are, and to look for partners in our supply chain, who are aligned to those goals. So it’s number one, it’s them, it’s those suppliers and partners doing things like we’ve done internally to help with that, for example, you know, we’ve put solar panels on the roof, we’ve, we only procure green electricity, and that type of thing. So it’s looking for partners and suppliers who do that, then there’s a side that we can influence a little bit more is about strategically working with partners from a geographical point of view, so we import very, very little from the east, or the Americas. We are very heavily based around the UK and Europe which obviously naturally reduces the amount of transport and or carbon emissions that come from that. So they’re probably some examples of of how we can really influence it. You know, some other successes as you know, moving the vehicle fleet over to you know, the obvious things like hybrid and then on to, you know, electric, EV vehicles and that type of thing. So, they’re probably some of the key ways that we’re, we’re looking to influence it.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Yes, and that is inspirational. Just like to know to to conclude what your next sustainability goals are, are there any you’re thinking of adding on?
Tom Hulbert
I really are, I say I should say we really want to link in to what our customers want in terms of what their goals are for sustainability. And we know that, you know, we’re dealing quite a lot with public organisations, but it’s also very becoming more and more important for private organisations like ourselves. And they are having lots of conversations like we had a couple of years ago around the boardroom tables about what are we going to do for our goals around becoming carbon net zero and producing carbon Net Zero roadmaps like we might have already done. And the ultimate goal for me is to say, when we, when somebody procures either a product or a service or a package offer us that we’re actually able to tell our clients what the carbon impact is, of that product, service or package. And in that way, I’ll help them number one, measure scope three emissions for them, it will help them measure them more accurately, because so sometimes it can be very challenging to get that data for scope three. But secondly, with us working to have more carbon Net Zero effective solutions and products and things and services allows us to have a lower impact in the first place, not just measuring it. So feeding that data into clients, I think is the big next step for us.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Sharing information, which is basically what the podcast is here for as well. And I really thank you for sharing the information of your sustainability package with our listeners. Thank you so much.
Tom Hulbert
Thank you very much for having me on. Lorie.
Lori Pinkerton-Rolet
Thank you so much, Tom. And you’ll find links to the Innova sustainability policy for inspiration for your own company on the podcast page for this episode at ThirdAge.Design. Time for our review from the TAD International Events Calendar. The Alzheimer’s Association International Conference is on from July 16, to the 20th in Amsterdam in the Netherlands. And while you’re there may I personally recommend a small restaurant called Taki Thai but please don’t eat the chili’s. (You have been warned.) Homecare Con in Orlando, Florida, USA will be later this month, from the 31st of July to the 3rd of August, and Rehab Care, the world’s largest trade fair for rehabilitation and care, is in Dusseldorf Germany from the 13th to the 16th of September. As always, you’ll find further details and listings on the Industry Events page at ThirdAge. Design. Thank you to today’s special guest Danny Sharpe to our ‘Innovation Spotlight’ guest Tom Holbert. To our producer Mike Scales, and to Valerie Adler of The Right Website. To Peter Thorne, who composed our theme music and is playing the piano with Mary Blanchard on flute, and to our sponsor, Innova Care Concepts, the leading edge of health care. Finally to you, and you’ve heard this before, but I really mean it. Thank you for being part of a community that’s 30 countries wide, who believes we can improve senior environments together. I’m Lori Pinkerton-Rolet and I do hope you’ll join me next month when we begin our series, the ‘World Series of Senior Living Design,’ looking at what we can learn about care dimension retirement design from different cultures and environments, which we may wish to adapt or consider for our own beginning with South Africa. I do hope you’ll join me.