Sustainable Routes offers grants of up to £1,000 to businesses who want to cut business travel costs by adopting new ways of working.

If your business is based in Buckinghamshire, Milton Keynes, Oxfordshire and Berkshire and ranges in size from sole trader to 250 employees, you will be eligible to apply.

Simply register online at www.sustainableroutes.co.uk to receive your personalised Travel Efficiency Plan and Grant Application form.

Here at Kirkpatrick & Hopes we are applying for the grant to allow us to install showers and a bike shelter for the benefit of our team members who cycle to work, and also to buy some notebook computers and software to allow us to do video conferencing.

The Carbon Trust is a not-for-profit organisation, which is why it is offering this generous deal. Its main aim is to provide specialist support to business and the public sector to help cut carbon emissions and save energy. This makes sense to business, too, because energy savings mean lower energy bills – not to mention the reduced carbon footprint, which may be required by law in the future.

Loans are for energy saving projects (rather than specific equipment) and they are linked to the expected energy savings. Examples of projects are:

• Air conditioning
• Building insulation
• New boilers
• Heating controls

Sounds too good to be true? Visit the Carbon Trust website and find out if you are eligible.

Having just recovered from Christmas and come back to work, one of the first tasks of the working year is to take down the decorations. The tinsels and baubles will be packed away to be reused next year, the Christmas cards will be recycled, and the tree will go on our compost heap.

As far as green resolutions go in 2010, at K&H we will be looking further into reducing our energy use and finding more about ways of carbon offsetting.

We tend to think that it is the small changes that we can all make that help to create a better world. If you would like to make a difference, here are some ideas for business resolutions:

• buy recycled products (e.g. paper, envelopes, pencils)
• encourage working from home to reduce emissions from commuting
• start a cycle-to-work scheme
• drive a car with low emissions (less than 120g/km)
• order supplies in large amounts to reduce packaging and deliveries
• use energy-efficient lighting
• turn off computers, monitors, printers and other machines at night
• switch off monitors at lunchtime or when away from your desk for any length of time
• print double-sided
• drink tap water rather than bottled

If you have any other ideas for being greener at work, I’d love to hear them. Email me.

Susan Kemish
Operations Director

We first decided to get rid of the water cooler as the result of a brainstorming session last year on ways to reduce our carbon emissions. The reason was to save on the electricity used in powering the cooler.

However, we have now found other benefits:

Cost – bottled water can cost about £1 per litre, whereas tap water is less than 1p per litre

Health – tap water in the UK is among the safest in the world. There have been reports that the chemicals from the plastic bottles can be leached into the water, especially if the water is at high temperatures.

Environmental – the world is polluted by the production, transport, packaging and disposal of plastic water bottles (over a billion per year in the UK). This seems absurd when there is good quality drinking water literally ‘on tap’ in all our homes and offices. 86% of plastic bottles end up as rubbish – that’s 1,500 water bottles every second!

By the way, if you notice that we do still have some bottled water available, it is because we are using up our stocks. We will not be buying any more once these have been finished.

Our apple tree!!

Now that spring has arrived we have launched the K&H gardening club in earnest.

Our gardener, Ron, finally decided to retire at the age of 80, so we have decided to see if we can maintain the garden ourselves.   So far we have cut the grass, dug a couple of new flower beds, cleared out some shrubs to make way for a bigger vegetable patch, and planted an apple tree and some strawberries.   We have also planted tomatoes, lettuces, cucumbers, beans, sunflowers, poppies, marigolds and foxgloves which we have grown from seed.  It’s amazing how much a few people can achieve by working together for just an hour a week.

Apparently the production and transport of our food causes about a quarter of our carbon footprint, so by growing even just a small amount of our food we feel we can make a real difference, and save money and energy as well, and it might even taste good too!!

If you would like to share your green ideas with us, please add a comment below.

The way this works is by showing a constant display of the cost per hour of the electricity being used at any time. We have been using an energy monitor for a few weeks now, and this has shown that we tend to use between 80p – £1.55 during the day and this drops down to around 40p per hour at night and at weekends.

It has made a difference in that we are more conscious of whether lights or equipment need to be switched on.  Once you become aware of how much energy you are using you automatically start to look for ways of cutting down.

Find out more about how an energy monitor could save you money.

If you would like to share your green ideas with us, please contact add a comment below.

We effectively give a loan for the cost of the bike which is repayable from gross salary, so saving tax & NI on the payments. There are savings for both the employee and the employer.  This should result in a healthier happier workforce.

The bike must be used for at least 50% of work journeys but can also be used socially.

Find out more about the cycle scheme.

If you would like to share your green ideas with us, please contact Susan Kemish on 0118 923 5811 or add a comment below.

Last year we all put our heads together to come up with ways in which we could be more eco friendly and between us we came up with over 30 ideas. Over the last 12 months we have done most of the easy things, like changing to energy efficient light bulbs, recycling as much as possible, switching off computers and printers at night and starting our own compost heap. But we are now going to look into other ways to be greener and come up with a plan for the next year or so. I will update on our efforts over the next few months!

Meanwhile, we are starting to think about what to grow in the K&H garden this year. All the team tend to get involved in one way or another, whether by bringing in surplus vegetable plants from home, weeding or eating the produce.

We started our own compost heap last year and have been adding various vegetable matter over the winter and are hoping our homemade compost will help provide us with bumper vegetable crops in the summer and autumn. I will keep you posted!

If you would like to share your green ideas with us, please contact Susan Kemish on 0118 923 5811 or by email

If you sometimes work from home, you are doing your bit for the environment by cutting down on travelling costs and reducing your carbon footprint. But when its cold outside you probably find that you need to heat your house for most of the day and will end up with higher heating costs.

For more information about what could be available where you live have a look at the Energy Saving Trust’s website.

Other ways to keep your heating costs down when working from home:

• If your home office is upstairs and south facing, you can benefit from heat rising and the warmth from the sun
• Try switching the heating off for part of the day, you may find that it is enough to only have it on for an hour in the morning, then another hour in the middle of the day and then you may not need it again until it gets dark
• Take a break and do some exercise.  A brisk walk at lunchtime could warm you up for the start of the afternoon.

If you would like to share your green ideas with us,  please contact Susan Kemish on 0118 923 5811 or by email.

Having read in the papers over the last couple of weeks that the market for recyclable materials has declined in line with the downturn in the economy, I was shocked to find that some of our carefully sorted recyclable waste could even end up in landfill.

Reduce - Reducing waste should take priority over re-use and recycling. Buying less or buying goods with less packaging would be better options. Avoid disposable items e.g. plastic cups.

Re-use - Again this is better than recycling. Can it be repaired rather than being thrown away? Sell what you no longer need or give it to charity.

Recycle – most councils have facilities to collect recyclable waste from our homes, so there really is no excuse for not recycling. Remember to buy recycled products if possible as there needs to be a market for the finished goods as well as the raw materials.

If you would like to share your green ideas with us, please contact Susan Kemish on 0118 923 5811 or by email