Green Impact Award

In the last 8 months NOSY has transitioned towards working with Sustainable and green tech businesses, this shift has driven us to become more environmentally friendly and work towards being a net zero business.

We came across the green impact scheme in the Island Business magazine, we looked over the requirements and felt inspired to register ourselves. We were happy to hear it can help us reduce our carbon footprint as well as the costs for the business, it was also great for team engagement. Having a goal with clear achievable steps helps bring the team closer together to work towards an award.

- Green Impact

It was really useful having a workbook to work through and the portal was easy to navigate. Working through some of the actions we found we were on the right path, a good portion of the tasks we were already doing/in the process of doing and others were things we hadn't thought of before. An additional feature of this scheme is online workshops and discussions, we attended the Isle of Wight Green Impact Energy Workshop hosted by SOS (students organising for sustainability) which covered why prices of energy are increasing and ways we can manage it as well as giving us information on funding we could access to help our business become more energy efficient.

For information on grant funding for helping your business becoming more sustainable locase.co.uk.

Alongside the Green Impact actions, it inspired us to go further. Though some of these were not carried out directly for the Green Impact, it was a result of the scheme which inspired us.

• Introducing inhouse Eco workshops
• Cycle2work Scheme
• Health Insurance for all team members including their children
• Environmental Management System (EMS)
• Website page dedicated to sustainability
• Environmental Training
• Became a Living Wage Accredited
• Planted 2,800 trees
• Offset 72 tons of Carbon
• Sponsored a local beehive

A few highlights from the Green Impact:

• Reduced Electric use by 36%
• Reduced Water use by 34%
• Reduced Waste 22%

The Green Impact scheme has really helped NOSY on our sustainability journey, it has helped us push green practices in the business and inspire other businesses to do the same. We believe everyone has a responsibility when it comes to climate action, even small actions will have an impact. It’s more important than ever for businesses to become more environmentally friendly to ensure a future for the next generations.

As of November, we had successfully accumulated 377 points which earnt us a Gold Awad. We were audited to ensure the actions have been carried out properly and all the evidence submitted was reviewed by students who have been trained by SOS-UK (students organising for sustainability UK). The team were super happy with the results as all the hard work paid off, it has also helped to change our mindset towards sustainability which resulted in a change of lifestyle and behaviour (cycling to work, energy saving at home, reducing food waste, green alternative products etc).

But we won't stop here, we plan to keep working towards a more sustainable business, we want to work towards B corp, introduce 1% for the Planet and invest in more energy-efficient products. We would like to grow the community event Rubbish Networking and continue our learning journey.