SUPPLIER SUMMIT SUSTAINABILITY IN ACTION
Stephen Harrison is CEO of Forterra. He talked to NBG Partners and Suppliers about the reasons the group is so committed to the sustainable agenda.
I
s the industry the bad guy here? That’s the question that Stephen Harrison, CEO of Forterra, put to NBG Partner and Supplier delegates at the Supplier Summit. “After COP-26, we (those who run energy-intensive industries) are the bad guys, we’re seen as the big polluters. So, let’s talk about that a little bit. “There are three things I want to talk to you about and get you to think about both as Partners and Suppliers,” he said. “We have a responsibility as businesses to educate the consumer and be more transparent about our information.” Currently, the data is very inconsistent, with everyone using different data, measurements and messages, he continued. “For example, do we include transportation or do we just include manufacturing? Do we use the installation of the product? I can talk to you about bricks, but am I also including mortar? Probably not. If I’m talking about the cost of a bricklayer, am I talking about the carbon emitted when a bricklayer is driving his van? Probably not. So, there’s a whole bunch of data points and we’re all using different ones. We need to log our figures and our measurements better, to more consistent measurements and data points that we use as an industry to help educate the consumer.”
The culture of sustainability needs to be
embedded into an organisation in the same way that Health & Safety is, Harrison continued. “Everyone who works in our business, I’m guessing it’s the same in your businesses, now understand that health and safety is the responsibility of every person there. We have got to the point where health and safety is everyone’s problem. What we need to try and do is get sustainability to have the same level of importance as health and safety. We need to get that culture, and get everyone in our businesses thinking about it.”
The three main challenges when it comes to reducing carbon centre around information, culture and innovation, Harrison said, and that is where the time and effort should be focussed. Forterra, he added, had reduced carbon emissions by 27%, waste to landfill by 98%, and mains water use by 20% in the last 10 years. “We think that’s pretty good. We’ve all been
working on this for some time, but maybe we haven’t made it quite as important as we could have done.”
“We used to use the word sustainability, now we’re talking about environment, social and governance. Now we have targets around plastic, innovation, people and carbon. Five years ago, all anyone talked to me about was money: how much cash have you got, how big your margin is, how many customers. They were the three things our investors asked us, now 50% of the time I spend with investors they’re asking about what we are doing to the planet, how we are looking after our people, what we are doing socially, what we are doing environmentally. Interestingly, in five years, only one investor has ever asked me about health and safety, which I think is incredibly sad.”
Harrison said that by 2050, energy intensive businesses need to be broadly net zero in terms of carbon. “How do we do it? We don’t entirely know,” he admitted. “There are plenty of existing technologies, things we can do today to make a difference, and that’s what brought Forterra the 27% reduction in carbon emissions over the last 10 years. There are also loads of emerging technologies which are moving incredibly fast. We need to understand, adopt and engage with these. What we can’t do is worry about not reaching zero-carbon in 2050 because the technology is not there yet. We have to accept that some stuff is in the future and focus on what we can do now.”
The “little wins”, Harrison said, that people can concentrate on now include: low energy lighting, renewable electricity, alternative fuels and process improvements.
“The next thing that I do think is an easy win is in packaging. We need to challenge ourselves; we accept that we cannot compromise safety. Putting our branding on plastic may be good advertising, but is it necessary? Could we work together on this as an industry? Could we do something around pallets for example? Could we work around recycling? Could we sign up for some sort of packaging pallet programme? At the moment, everyone is waiting for someone else to do it, hoping it does not cost them.” Harrison said he believed that NBG is well- placed to work with Suppliers to show a sense of leadership. “At Forterra, we made a big commitment to halve the amount of packaging we use by 2025, it’s tough to hit, but it makes good business sense and it makes good environmental sense.
“We don’t need to worry about stuff that we don’t know, we need to focus on stuff that we do know, and keep innovating to drive our businesses forward and become more sustainable.”
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