Managing our contribution to climate change

Limiting our impacts on climate change is key to ensuring a sustainable future. We believe that a combined approach to managing the unavoidable impacts of climate change on our business and to reducing our greenhouse gas emissions is vital.

The challenge for our business, our regulators and our stakeholders is to find climate change solutions that balance competing environmental, social and economic demands in a sustainable, integrated and equitable way.

We are committed to reducing our carbon emissions and will spend over £7 million on implementing energy efficiency measures from 2007 to 2009.

Renewable energy

To mitigate our potential climate change impacts, we have cut our emissions through energy and business efficiencies.

We have combined this with increasing use of self-generated renewable energy. This makes beneficial use of methane gas and sewage sludge produced during sewage treatment processes.

We currently generate over 14 per cent of our own energy needs from renewable sources.

Carbon Trust Standard

The Carbon Trust Standard is the world's first award scheme that requires organisations to measure, manage and reduce their carbon footprint and actually make real reductions year-on-year.

Thames Water is the only UK utility company to receive the award after reducing its emissions by 21,700 tonnes over the past three years. The reduction is a result of improved operational efficiency and new technology. The two major ways in which this has been achieved are:

• Generating renewable power from sewerage sludge at 21 sewage treatment works to help power the sites
• Increasing the efficiency of pumping water and sewage across the Thames region - one of the company's most energy intensive processes

Key facts:

• We generate over 14 per cent of our own energy needs from renewable sources and have a target of 18 per cent by 2010.
• The water industry emits about one per cent of the UK's greenhouse gases.
• Our total net greenhouse gas emissions according to Defra guidelines for 2007/2008 were 876,010 tonnes of CO2e (CO2 equivalent).
• Our net greenhouse emissions per megalitre of treated water was 300 kg of CO2e.
• Our net greenhouse emissions per megalitre of sewage treated was 350 kg of CO2.
• Thames Water will be part of the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) which is a new mandatory emissions trading scheme, announced in the Energy White Paper 2007.