Plants4Presents commit to reducing their Carbon footprint by 90%

As part of our ongoing commitment to the environment we're determined to dramatically reduce our consumption of carbon and we've set an ambitious target to achieve NetZero by 2030.

The evidence is undeniable, carbon and other emissions from industry and individuals are changing our atmosphere and directly leading to global warming. Scientists have been trying to warn us about global warming for decades and sadly we are now seeing the devastating affects of these rising temperatures and associated extreme weather patterns becoming a reality. NetZero campaigns have been given a bad name by corporations promoting greenwashing and dubious carbon offsets but for us, this is simply about focussing on and tackling our energy consumption head on.

By dividing the nursery up into controlled temperature zones and minimising the area that we heat to tropical temperatures, we've dramatically reduced our energy consumption this winter.

Inspired by a brilliant course on NetZero run by the infectious Adam Bostock and Dougal Fleming in partnership with Lewes District Council, we've committed to doing everything we can to achieve NetZero by 2030. We've started recording our scope 1 and scope 2 emissions and actively looking at how much and what kind of energy we're using. We're delighted to see that our work this winter on better insulation and temperature controls in the nursery is already paying dividends. By controlling our temperature 'zones' much more carefully, we've already reduced our wood pellet consumption by 65% from 2022 to 2023.

At Plants4Presents we want to be part of a positive movement for change.

We still have a chance to slow the rise of global warming and despite the gloom and doom in the media there are some really positive examples of dramatic and large scale changes in energy production in UK, Europe and also globally. Did you know that Scotland now produces more renewable energy than it can consume? (see Scottish renewables website for all the latest statistics on the wind and hydro energy production in Scotland) or that in March 2024 32.9% of the electricity we consumed in the UK was generated by wind turbines? (See the National Grid website for lots more fun facts like this.) As a small business or an individual we can feel like our effect is limited but one step in the right direction can help to lead others. There are over 65 million people and 5 million small businesses in the UK and if we all start now, imagine what we could achieve? together we can dramatically reduce our national and eventually our global footprint.

We've a long way to go and there will be challenges along the way but if you are thinking of starting out on a NetZero journey or you are interested in the nitty gritty of what we are doing to bring our numbers down then please do read the full story and we'll post more updates as they come through.