CASE STUDY: Mitie

Mitie Plan Zero – making zero carbon happen

Fighting climate change is a priority for Mitie which is why, in February 2020, the company launched Plan Zero, its industry-leading commitment to reach net zero by 2025, 25 years ahead of the UK Government’s target.

To achieve this goal, Mitie’s Plan Zero efforts have focused on tackling the three key areas of environmental impact for the business – power and transport, energy efficiency of its buildings, and non-sustainable waste.

With around 50 sites across the UK, Mitie has a significant commercial building footprint. To make its sites more energy efficient, Mitie is implementing energy optimisations, such as tweaking heating and cooling settings, and introducing a new comfort policy which sets the optimum temperature and lighting levels, to reduce the amount of energy the business uses in the first place. These changes are expected to save over 100,000 kWh of energy per year, the equivalent to more than 22 tonnes of carbon or 33 return flights from London to New York.

In the longer-term, the business has committed to a net zero estate by 2025, with its first four zero emission buildings by the end of March 2022. Initiatives include installing heat pumps and switching to 100% renewable energy. Mitie will use this experience to switch another 14 sites to net zero every year until its target is met.

With electric vehicles responsible for more than 90% of its carbon emissions, Mitie has one of the UK’s most ambitious electric vehicle commitments. The business has pledged to eliminate carbon emissions from its fleet by switching all of its 7,100 vehicles to electric by 2025, with more than 1,500 pure electric Mitie cars, vans, and even an electric gritter, already on the road.

To cut down its non-sustainable waste, Mitie is working with its suppliers to reduce the amount of single-use materials it uses. This includes the company’s ‘Bin the Bag’ initiative, with new bins that don’t require plastic liners being rolled out across the business. This is helping to save around 40,000 plastic bin bags, more than half a tonne of plastic, each year.

Since Plan Zero was launched, Mitie has already made significant progress cutting its carbon emissions. However, in order for the UK to achieve its goal of reaching net zero by 2050, every organisation must do its part. Therefore, in addition to committing to cutting its own carbon, a key component of Plan Zero was also for Mitie to share its facilities, energy and waste management expertise to help public and private sector organisations achieve their own sustainability goals.

Mitie has saved 353,000 tonnes of CO₂ for its customers over the past decade, equivalent to around 11 times the annual emissions of Mitie, demonstrating the huge impact the business can have by sharing its experience with other organisations. It has also published its Plan Zero Playbook, a step-by-step guide based on its own experience to help organisations create effective decarbonisation plans.

Reaching net zero carbon emissions is not a linear process. It requires a constant review of progress to ensure the business is doing as much as it can to cut its carbon footprint and find new opportunities to go further, faster. This philosophy is central to Plan Zero, which is why Mitie marked its first anniversary by setting to a number of new targets and commitments aimed at accelerating its progress to zero emissions. As Mitie head towards the target date of 2025, it will continue to not only push itself, but also its suppliers, customers and competitors to do more to reduce their impact on the planet.