Page last updated at 12:11 GMT, Monday, January 23 2012
Going green
Sustainability is an issue that is growing in
importance. As more and more people become concerned about
this issue they are beginning to question how the goods and
services they consume are affecting the environment. Being
sustainable makes sound business sense. Not only will you be
helping to protect the environment, it is also a great marketing
tool, and it can have a positive effect on your balance sheet
too! Find out more below about the organisations that can
help boost your green credentials and save money at the same
time.
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Sustainable Business
Partnership
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The Hampshire & Isle of Wight Sustainable
Business Partnership exists to encourage all businesses to adopt
sustainable business practices. Whether you are new to
sustainability or already committed and wanting to do more, the
Sustainable Business Partnership can offer support and advice.
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Carbon
Trust
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The Carbon Trust offers support, insight and solutions to help
businesses manage their environmental impact.
The Carbon Trust also
offers a 0% business loan scheme to fight high
energy bills and climate change.
Interest free loans of up to £500,000 are
available from the Carbon Trust to help businesses replace old
equipment with new, energy efficient upgrades. No security is
required – and the loans scheme is designed so that anticipated
energy savings cover monthly repayments.
Equipment Finance
UK businesses can now
apply for green equipment finance from Carbon Trust and Siemens.
Worth up to £550 million over the next three years, the dedicated
low carbon finance scheme is the first of its kind and will enable
UK businesses to invest in cost effective energy efficiency
equipment and other low carbon technologies, such as new efficient
lighting and biomass heating.
Siemens Financial Services UK Ltd will
provide the financial backing and manage the provision of funding,
whilst Carbon Trust Implementation Services Limited (a subsidiary
of the Carbon Trust) will use its expertise in carbon saving from
energy efficient technologies to independently assess the carbon,
energy and cost savings of any project. This should enable the
financing to pay for itself through energy savings and result in no
net cost to the customer.
See
what carbon reduction can do for your business
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PLATO:
Sustain
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PLATO: Sustain is a European funded 2 year project which
provides SMEs with free access to a specialist business and
personal development programme aimed at improving their business
sustainability.
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Green
Grants Machine
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is a FREE website to help you find the
funding on offer to boost your business's bottom line by improving
its environmental performance. |
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The
Environment Centre
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The Environment
Centre helps businesses, community groups and
households to manage their environmental impact. They offer
training and consultancy to help you identify ways that your
business can reduce waste and reduce costs at the same time.
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The
Energy Saving Trust
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The Energy Saving Trust provides a range
of resources to help your household reduce carbon dioxide
emissions. They deal primarily with domestic property. |
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CarbonFREE
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Do you want to help tackle the causes of climate change and help
the local community at the same time?
One way you could do this is to invest in projects that will
help to balance carbon dioxide emissions in Eastleigh Borough by
investing in sustainable energy projects locally.
CarbonFREE is a fund managed by Eastleigh Borough Council.
You pay in an amount to offset your carbon emissions and the money
is used to fund energy saving projects for local community
groups.
Find out more from the
CarbonFREE web page
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Envirowise
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Envirowise is a government agency that delivers
free, independent advice to UK businesses. This assistance enables
companies to increase profitability and reduce environmental
impact.
Find out more by
visiting the website
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Marco Polo – New ways of green transport
Europe's road network suffers from
ever-growing congestion, increasing the time lost by road users and
worsening environmental pollution.
By Kamille Bollerup 2011
Long-distance freight, particularly international freight
traffic among EU member states and between the EU and third
countries, is a major contributor to the growing congestion of the
European roads. Trucks are often the preferred way to transport
freight from the start to the end of a delivery, but they are
costly - both in economic and environmental terms - over long
distances. The European Commission is determined to take action in
bringing about substantial improvements in the quality and
efficiency of transport in Europe. The Marco Polo Program is part
of the Commission’s actions plans. The Marco Polo program aims t o
shift or avoid a substantial part of the expected increase in
international freight traffic, estimated at 20 billion
ton-kilometres per year, from Europe's roads onto short-sea
shipping,
rail and inland waterway transport.
(Source:
http://engineers.ihs.com/news/2008/eu-en-freight-transport-12-08.htm
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The program basically aims to ease road congestion and the
pollution following by promoting a switch to greener transport
modes for European freight traffic.
Companies with realistic projects to shift freight from roads to
greener modes can turn to Marco Polo for financial support, so can
companies aiming to avoid or reduce road transport, or offering
support services like management systems, cargo control and common
IT platforms or special training programmes. Over
the period 2003-2009, 125 projects involving more than 500
companies have received funding from the Marco Polo programme.
Every year, a new group of projects qualifies for funding. The
Marco Polo Programme ’s budget for 2007-2013 is €450 million.
(Source: http://ec.europa.eu/transport/marcopolo/
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About the Programme
The programme
finances; Modal shifts from road to rail and waterborne systems.
Catalyst actions which promote modal shift. Motorways of the sea
between major ports. Traffic avoidance and Common learning
actions.
Funding is in the form of an outright grant – it is not a loan
to be repaid later.
Marco Polo is run by the European Commission’s Directorate-General
for Mobility & Transport and the EU's Executive Agency for
Competitiveness and Innovation (the EACI)
In the period 2007-2009 70 projects were selected for grants.
The maximum subsidy amount per project ranged from €0.37 million to
€7.5 million. These projects aim to take a total of 54 billion
tonne-kilometres of freight off the roads each year. The total
benefit to society as a result of avoiding the environmental and
social costs of road freight traffic is estimated to be worth €1.4
billion.
Directory of Green Businesses In Eastleigh
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