BAM halves waste to landfill two years ahead of forecast and sets zero return as part of its long-term sustainability targets

The announcement came in BAM’s fourth sustainability report published today. It sets out the company's performance and describes its progress against its targets. The report also sets out targets and aspirations taking BAM to 2015 and covers a programme for managing climate change, waste management, sustainable design, responsible sourcing and partnerships.

Key among these commitments is a reduction of carbon emissions by 25% against a 2008 baseline, and a further 25% reduction in construction waste against 2010’s baseline. The company is now aiming for zero non-hazardous waste to landfill. It has also committed to providing 1,000 new employment and training opportunities through its operations.

The company’s community impact is also revealed. During 2010, BAM contributed around £600,000 to local communities, made up of £467,223 to the community through cash, staff time and gifts in-kind, and a further £130,000 from employees, clients and suppliers.

The company introduced a volunteering allowance of two days’ paid leave for all staff. BAM adopted Barnardo’s as its charity partner for a period of two years.

In the past few weeks BAM has been listed as Britain’s best contractor to work for, 14th in the UK’s Best Green Companies and achieved gold status in Business in the Community’s Corporate Responsibility Index.

Graham Cash, Chief Executive of BAM Construct UK, said: ‘Sustainability is intrinsic to how we deliver solutions for our clients every day. It’s how we do business. We see the market for sustainable low-carbon buildings expanding every year. To show how important it is to us we have developed a set of longer-term targets right up to 2015.  We were in the forefront of leading the industry in embedding health and safety principles. We are committed to achieving similar progress on sustainability.’

Further highlights include:

• Total CO2 emissions fell slightly to 19,626 tonnes. BAM reduced fuel use by 480,000 litres, emissions from its premises by 8% and transport emissions by 6%. Normalized against turnover, its CO2 emissions rose slightly by 4% due to the severe winter weather conditions.
• Introduced BAM SMaRT - an innovative online monitoring system to measure the environmental performance of all its sites, allowing better data capture and analysis.
• Introduced BIM (building information modeling) 3D modeling on design projects, enabling it to optimise design solutions helping to construct buildings more cost-effectively.
• In 2010 it introduced a transport strategy. BAM’s 2500 employees drove 720,000 fewer business miles and used 44,000 fewer litres of fuel in its commercial fleet.  Average company car fleet emissions reduced to 133kg CO2/km.
• Reduced office supply deliveries by 17%, reduced paper usage by 12%, colour and black and white copies (9% and 14%) and 83% of the paper it used was from a sustainable source.

To read BAM Construct UK’s report and its approach to sustainability please visit http://www.bam.co.uk.

Further information: Mark Slattery, Press and Media Manager, BAM Construct UK Ltd, 01442 238415.