Zero carbon commuting - the business case

Many of us give very little thought to the commute beyond how we get from A to B, with millions of us making the same journeys every day. These journeys bear a huge environmental impact on our planet, generating 18 billion kg of CO2e annually - 5% of the UK’s total emissions.

Speaking at the ‘Zero Carbon Commuting - The Business Case’ webinar, Mark Dodwell, Director of Climate Propositions at NatWest said facilitating sustainable mobility was ‘every employer’s obligation’ - but when budgets are tight, even the most willing Transport and Sustainability teams can struggle to get sustainable mobility initiatives signed off.

The cost of ignoring commuting emissions is infinitely more than financial – but money talks, so here’s some food for thought that can help strengthen your Zero Carbon Commuting business case.

Commuting carbon costs

The annual economic costs of commuting carbon emissions total £2.7 billion in England alone. When it comes to the commute, large employers are potentially missing out on huge cost savings by failing to support their teams to travel more sustainably.

The commute is one of the most inefficient journeys we ever make, particularly when we drive alone. Cars take up space – and lots of it. Workplace parking costs employers £6 billion in rent equivalents every year, not including the additional £1 billion in annual business rates.

To give an idea of how much money and land is tied up in staff parking, Jacobs Director of Economics, John Siruat, calculated that if half of all UK car parking was repurposed for residential use, it could reach a staggering value of between £2.6 to £8 billion, creating approximately 150,000 homes.

Employee engagement, recruitment and retention

The commute may only be one part of the employee experience – but it is a ‘make or break’ one for many of us. According to Total Jobs, 54% of Britons would quit their job because of the commute. When you consider that the average cost of employee turnover is £30,614, the commute could be costing your business huge sums every year.

Sustainable mobility initiatives have repeatedly been shown to protect and promote the health, wealth and wellbeing of your workforce. Generous transport and travel policies are widely considered a valuable employee benefit. Cycle schemes, subsidized public transport, shuttle buses, and car-sharing communities help employees make greener travel choices. This saves them money, and in the case of active travel commutes, promotes healthy behaviours (which are also associated with boosted workplace productivity!).

If you require your team to come into the office, even for only part of the time, ensuring that journey is time and cost-effective is key to holding on to top talent. Now more so than ever as fuel costs continue to rise.

Working from home isn’t necessarily the best option

There’s a common assumption that working from home is the natural solution to decarbonising the commute. The truth is, however, not that simple and whether remote working saves emissions or generates more, depends on a number of factors.

Collecting both commuting and energy data is key to capturing the true picture of potential emissions savings and outputs. This includes understanding how your team commute, the distance they travel, and whether they’re home alone or there are other people in the house.

For some, analysis has shown that hybrid working can offer the worst of both worlds. Emissions generated from heating single occupancy homes in addition to large office blocks can be higher than those generated from the commute alone. It’s important to bear these environmental considerations in mind when developing new policies, practices and processes in regard to the return to the workplace.

Ignoring commuting CO2e will result in the failure of net-zero goals

By 2023, the majority of large employers will be required to publish detailed plans on how they plan to achieve net zero in line with the UK's 2050 net-zero target. This will require you to measure, reduce and report on your emissions, including those generated by your workforce’s commute which is categorized as a Scope 3 emission.

This means that despite not being in your organisation’s direct control, you are responsible for reducing them in line with your wider net-zero goals. Simply put, if you fail to tackle Scope 3 commuting emissions, you will fail your net-zero goals.

How companies who fall short of net-zero will be penalised is yet to be seen. However, even if you escape a fine, forward-looking companies will appreciate that climate change is one of the largest threats to economic stability.

There’s also the reputational damage to consider with consumers and staff. In August 2020, Reuters conducted a survey of 2,000 UK office workers. 72% of respondents stated that they were concerned about the environment, with 83% of workers believing their workplaces were not doing enough to address climate change.

There’s huge potential to optimise the commute

There’s no denying Zero Carbon Commuting is a huge undertaking – but it’s one with latent potential that could see us give up our habitual and unnecessary reliance on cars.

532,214 individual employee postcodes have been analysed using the Mobilityways Platform to identify the viable, real-world, active travel, public transport and car-sharing commutes available to each employee. It revealed that 95% of the sample, from over 350 large employers in the UK, had at least 1 sustainable commuting option available to them. 40% lived within walking or cycling distance. Over 50% had a viable public transport service available to them. 91% lived within 1 mile of a colleague that they could share a lift with.

Deputy Director of the NHS Net Zero Travel & Transport team, Paul Chandler, believes that “Changing personal behaviours to reduce carbon emissions isn’t a strong enough argument in and of itself for most people to change their deeply ingrained commuting behaviours. You need to make it personal to people, you need them to understand how to make the switch.”

When it comes to sustainable commuting, changing the hearts and minds of your organisation might be as simple as revealing what’s in the art of the possible – but first, you have to capture that data.