Green Impact

Introduction

Green Impact is an environmental accreditation and awards scheme run by the National Union of Students which aims to bring staff and students together to enable and showcase positive changes in environmental practice.

In March 2015/16 the Finance Division received a Gold Green Impact award and we hope to improve upon this in 2016/17.

The team for 2016/17 are Sara Whyte, Naomi  Richardson, Laura Gilbert, Sandra Daly, Michael Herlihy,and Rudy Ghosh. If you would like to get involved or have any energy saving ideas then please contact one of us.

Top 10 Greening Opportunities

1. Increasing number of plants in department – Finance Division have significantly increased the number of plants in the department
2. Reducing paper usage – staff are encouraged to think before they print (please refer to notice board)
3. Sustainability team strongly encourage division to use the scanner rather than printing – all staff have been given a scan to e-mail pin
4. Staff should take the stairs instead of using the lift  - please see notice board
5. Sustainability team promote recycling of stationery  - box in cupboard
6. Reduce amount of stationery ordered – Office Manager controls amounts ordered, promotes reuse where possible and refuses requests which are surplus to requirements
7. Air con / lighting / energy use  - to be kept within School parameters, “switch it off” stickers and posters placed in the office to encourage staff to conserve energy
8. Printing wastage – notice board
9. Food package wastage – recycling training continually offered to all staff
10. Plastic bag recycling – we have set up a plastic bag recycling box located in the kitchen

Top 5 Energy Saving Opportunities

1. Screen savers don’t save energy. Switch off at least the computer monitor when it’s not needed (A PC monitor switched off overnight saves enough energy to microwave six dinners).
2. Switch off your computer if you are not going to use it for 1 hour or more and don’t forget to turn it off at night.
3. Last person to leave the office? Make sure all electrical appliances are switched off
4. Unplug any unused appliances like mobile phone and mp3 chargers when not in use.
5. Do you have an external meeting? Did you know Finance Division have a conferencing phone available from the office manager that can be plugged into any network point?

Top 5 Negative Environmental Impacts

The Sustainability team have identified the following as the division’s top 5 negative impacts which we will be concentrating on improving on over the next year:

1. Energy use from computers, monitors and printers
2. Printing wastage
3. Food wastage
4. Mixing recycling
5. Stationary Wastage

LSE Green Purchasing

On the Finance Division webpage the purchasing team having now included a Green Procurement Consideration Checklist for your reference. This includes heaps of helpful tips so you can make sure your future purchases are as environmentally sustainably as possible.

Visiting Finance?

Take the Stairs – lose weight and reduce our carbon footprint

Did you know walking up a flight of stairs (on average 12 steps per flight) you burn 150 calories. Finance Division are located on the fifth floor of the library and walking up the 5 double flight stairs would be the equivalent of 5 pieces of chocolate, cup of hot chocolate or a pint of beer/glass of wine. The sustainability team would encourage all staff members to take the stairs instead of the lift and help reduce our Carbon Footprint!