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Posts Tagged ‘Government of the United Kingdom’

While most of the coverage of ‘green’ issues in the media and in environmental campaigns tends to focus on how an individual can promote a more eco-friendly lifestyle, arguably the biggest impact on the environment can be achieved by businesses and corporations addressing these issues. In this post I explore how a business can actually achieve environmental targets by keeping accurate records of their fixed assets – ie equipment, machinery, vehicles etc – and their carbon footprints.

Fixed asset management has many advantages. It allows your organisation to manage internal and external service providers to reduce administrative costs associated with asset maintenance and repairs. Software-based systems can capture data adrift in paper-based processes and provide asset-specific total cost of ownership information that can be analysed at a corporate level. However another dimension has been added that makes reliable asset management programmes even more essential. Whether you agree with the theory of man-made global warming or not, the UK government has decided to adopt a target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by at least 80% over 1990 levels by the year 2050.

Image credit: johnb/uk

The Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) requires that companies must achieve energy efficiencies (or purchase allowances from the government) based on the amount of CO2 emitted. Companies that achieve significant reductions will be rewarded financially. Those that do not will suffer the consequences. Carbon taxes will inevitably become more significant mechanisms for the Exchequer and there’s likely to be an increasing emphasis on enforcing regulations governing the collection, treatment and recycling of all sorts of waste, especially electrical and electronic equipment as specified by the WEEE directive. The Carbon Reduction Commitment will affect approximately 20,000 organisations in the public and private sectors and the Environment Agency requires disclosures to be submitted by those companies by the summer of 2010.

Sustainable environmental management is not only concerned with supply chain resource or carbon emissions management. It also addresses the wider issues of sustainable planning and design, waste reduction, water management, the efficiency of electronic and electrical equipment etc. All these facets of business operations are inputs into an organisation’s environmental impact and ultimately its bottom line. From a sales and marketing point of view, companies are also going to have to prove their “green credentials” to consumers and who are increasingly demanding that green tinge of virtually every product or service. Doing all this will create a significant cost for business, unless they get their fixed asset register in order. Organisations now have to prove their commitment to green issues through information transparency and fully auditable policies.

At the core of this approach has to be consistent and detailed information about the life cycle of all fixed assets, from country of origin, maintenance schedules and carbon efficiency to final disposal details. A good, up to date central asset register therefore will not only streamline year end audits but will also provide highly detailed insight into corporate assets that will enable management to make more informed decisions. Until you truly know what assets you’ve got, which you own and the real operational/ownership cost of those assets, managers cannot make informed decisions about capital expenditure, carbon footprint reduction and how to “green” the business in the most cost effective and beneficial way possible.

About the author:
Tom is a blogger currently working for a company specialising in software for asset tracking and fixed asset accounting. He passionately believes that businesses can go greener at the same time as cutting costs.