The Greener NHS Programme and Net Zero
Did you know that the NHS produces the same amount of CO2 as the country of Sri Lanka? As the largest employer in Britain, responsible for around 4% of the nation’s carbon emissions, the NHS has recognised the integral role it plays in the solution.
With the major threats to our health that climate change poses, it is imperative that changes are made in order to avoid the direct and immediate consequences.
Patients, the public and the NHS are faced with an accelerating change to the environment that will lead to an increase in health issues. But by making the necessary changes now, together we can save lives and improve the world we live in.
The NHS has certainly recognised the importance of managing carbon emissions and reducing their carbon footprint, with the Greener NHS Programme detailing how they plan to become the world’s first Net Zero national health service.
What is the Greener NHS Programme?
The purpose of the programme is to work together with staff, hospitals and the public to share ideas on how to reduce the impact the NHS has on the environment and therefore our health. There are a number of different goals that have been established for the health service to work towards, with the main one being to reach Net Zero by 2040 for direct emissions and 2045 for indirect emissions.
How does the NHS plan to reduce their emissions?
- Our care: By developing a framework to evaluate carbon reduction associated with new models of care being considered and implemented as part of the NHS Long Term Plan.
- Our medicines and supply chain: By working with our suppliers to ensure that all of them meet or exceed our commitment on net zero emissions before the end of the decade.
- Our transport and travel: By working towards road-testing for what would be the world’s first zero-emission ambulance by 2022, with a shift to zero emission vehicles by 2032 feasible for the rest of the fleet.
- Our innovation: By ensuring the digital transformation agenda aligns with our ambition to be a net zero health service, and implementing a net zero horizon scanning function to identify future pipeline innovations.
- Our hospitals: By supporting the construction of 40 new ‘net zero hospitals’ as part of the government’s Health Infrastructure Plan with a new Net Zero Carbon Hospital Standard.
- Our heating and lighting: By completing a £50 million LED lighting replacement programme, which, expanded across the entire NHS, would improve patient comfort and save over £3 billion during the coming three decades.
- Our adaptation efforts: By building resilience and adaptation into the heart of our net zero agenda, and vice versa, with the third Health and Social Care Sector Climate Change Adaptation Report in the coming months. 6 | Delivering a ‘Net Zero’ National Health Service
- Our values and our governance: By supporting an update to the NHS Constitution to include the response to climate change, launching a new national programme For a greener NHS, and ensuring that every NHS organisation has a board-level net zero lead, making it clear that this is a key responsibility for all our staff.
Many of these positive changes are taking place around us, with actions being taken both professionally and personally as people opt to reduce their environmental impact. But the challenge is obvious; how do you take such a complex system as large as the NHS and organise the data in a translatable way?
The Enistic Platform
With our carbon management platform, you can easily generate an accurate and real-time carbon footprint, as well as develop realistic Carbon Reduction Plans.
Our platform analyses and controls carbon and energy data in real-time across unlimited sites with unlimited user access. It facilitates the measurement, reporting, and management of an organisation’s carbon emissions.
It’s also the backbone of our carbon and energy management services. It allows our clients to much better understand when and where their carbon consumption is going with its easy to interpret dashboards and reports. It enables carbon and energy waste to be identified and to better manage consumption, leading to average savings of 28%.
You can also save time by uploading your data straight onto the platform, or let us worry about the data collection for you. Once your data is uploaded, you can generate various reports (SECR, ESOS, Full Carbon Footprint, Carbon Reduction Plan, etc). Once our experts have reviewed the report, you can download it in an editable format, so you can customise it and share it with your colleagues.
It’s all down to you and your needs. We understand that every Trust needs something different, which is why we adjust our platform to meet your needs.
The Ensitic Platform can be accessed anytime, anyplace, anywhere with your own personal and secure login.