Reducing emissions in our supply chain and materials
Our supply chain partners are the extension of our business that we rely on to help us deliver great service and brilliant buildings. Their activities on our projects are 99 times greater than our own direct emissions.
Our ambition is to help our supply chain partners achieve net zero operational carbon by 2040. We have also committed to reduce emissions from purchased goods and services by 55% by 2030 and by 100% by 2040 from a 2018 base year.
We monitor our progress by measuring emissions from purchased goods and services from our Category A supply chain partners. These are the businesses we work most closely with, and they make up at least two-thirds of our overall indirect, or ‘scope 3’ emissions. While we have control over our scope 1 and scope 2 emissions, which cover our own direct emissions, we have far less control over our scope 3 emissions. Scope 3 includes emissions from processes like the extraction and production of raw materials, transportation of goods and services, and disposal of waste.
In acknowledgement of our work to measure, manage and reduce carbon emissions from our supply chain, we became the first contractor to achieve a Level 3 in the Carbon Trust’s Supply Chain Standard in 2021.
Scope 3 emissions from our Category A suppliers
| 2018 (baseline) | 2022 | |
| Willmott Dixon Purchased Goods & Services (Cat A Suppliers)(1) (tCO2e) | 807,822 | 539,960 |
1. In line with the Science Based Target, this includes purchased goods and services from category A suppliers (which makes up at least two thirds of scope 3 emissions).
We work closely with our supply chain partners to support their carbon reduction plans and help our Category A suppliers to develop plans to lower diesel use by 2025 and eliminate it by 2030. A set of training courses is available to our partners via the Supply Chain Sustainability School’s learning platform.
We also updated our Sustainable Procurement Policy in 2022 to further strengthen our approach to reducing emissions from our supply chain. We focused on making our policy easier for our supply chain partners to use and understand, supporting innovative, sustainable, and industry leading procurement decisions. All Willmott Dixon’s supply chain partners are required to comply with the policy, and evidence of compliance with specific requirements is provided on request.
Supply Chain Sustainability School
Willmott Dixon is a founding member of the Supply Chain Sustainability School, which provides free training and resources on a range of environmental and social topics for the industry’s shared supply chain. We require all supply chain partners to be active members of the school.
Since its launch in 2012, more than 200 partners and 21,000 member companies have signed up to use this ‘virtual school’. At the end of 2022, 40 of our supply chain partners had achieved gold member status, 71 silver and 10 bronze. During 2022, 221 companies in our supply chain accessed the school’s resources, while 126 of those attended school events. We also supported the development and launch of the Supply Chain Sustainability School’s carbon emissions reporting portal and became the first school partner to reach the milestone of having 100 of our supply chain companies reporting data in the tool.
Reducing carbon in our materials
The materials used in construction all have a backstory. Their extraction, manufacture, and transportation all create greenhouse gas emissions. The same is true for deconstruction and disposal at the end of a building’s life.
Eliminating carbon from the production and distribution of construction materials is a complex challenge that provides an opportunity to make our supply chain more transparent and more resilient. While a great deal must change before the materials we use have zero carbon emissions, we are committed to lead our partners through the transition to deliver all our buildings with net zero embodied carbon by 2040.
In 2022, we carried out 28 life cycle carbon assessments on projects to help us develop our understanding of embodied carbon and the ways we can reduce it. On our projects, insights from carbon assessments inform our material and design choices. At Spelthorne Leisure Centre in Surrey (below), we switched the design from a composite steel deck for one made of cross laminated timber (CLT), which saved almost 1,220 tonnes of embodied carbon. A similar exercise on our Hollycroft Primary School project, in Hinckley, Leicestershire, found that the use of a timber rather than steel frame would save almost 39 tonnes of carbon, with the timber itself locking up 566 tonnes of carbon - the equivalent of taking 122 cars off the road for a year.
Our assessments of life cycle carbon also inform potential design choices on future projects. For instance, at St Nicholas School, in Croydon, we found significant life cycle carbon benefits from using a steel frame with a high recycled content (80%). This has opened investigation into the use of reused steel to achieve higher carbon savings on future projects. Early-stage discussions have started to explore the opportunities around this with a potential supply chain partner.
During 2023, our Brilliant Buildings Group will encourage customers to consider life cycle carbon across their projects, with publication of a new guide outlining the benefits of embodied carbon assessment and Willmott Dixon’s approach to carbon reduction.
Concrete Zero
In 2022, we became a founding member of a new global initiative, ConcreteZero. Launched by The Climate Group, in partnership with World Green Building Council and World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), the aim of the initiative is to reach 100% net zero concrete by 2050. ConcreteZero is working to improve our industry’s approach to embodied carbon, through setting industry-level targets and creating a reporting standard so that change can be measured.
Supply Chain for Solar Photovoltaics (PVs)
Increased use of PVs supports our net zero ambitions and forms a key part of Willmott Dixon’s low carbon offering. However, like any other product, their installation carries an embodied carbon impact from the emissions associated with production, construction, in-use, and end of life stages of the panels alongside any supporting equipment.
The rising demand for solar energy threatens to increase the risk of forced labour and modern slavery in global supply chains. Considering recent evidence of the presence of forced labour in PV manufacturing supply chains in Xinjiang, China, we have conducted research into how this may affect our supply chain. In collaboration with other leading industry bodies, we have identified solar suppliers that actively work to reduce the risk of forced labour within their supply chain and we share with our customers all the steps we take to minimise the risk of exploitative labour practices.