Building, refurbishing and operating our centres to minimise
their impact on the environment is a priority
82.9%
Of waste recycled, with 100 per cent diverted from landfill
100%
Of our UK directly purchased energy from renewable sources
30
UK centres with solar arrays installed
56.8
UK Intensity ratio Scope 1 and 2 emissions
Creating value for
Environment
Customers
People
Communities
Investors
Partners and suppliers
Helps mitigate principal risks
Compliance
Climate change
Contributing towards the SDGs
Increasingly efficient centres
We understand that our business has an impact on climate, the environment and nature; including land, forests and water ecosystems and we are committed to reducing the impacts from operations.
We also recognise biodiversity loss as an emerging risk, so protecting this is important to ensure the resilience of our business and the communities where we operate.
The burning of fossil fuels is damaging to the environment, and we seek to reduce our impact through reducing the energy we consume in our centres, on-site generation of renewable electricity and improving energy efficiency through a variety of initiatives:
- Our directly purchased electricity in UK and Canada is from 100% renewable sources (backed in the UK by REGOs and from 1 October 2024 in Canada by RECs)
- Promoting energy saving behavioural change within our centre teams
- Implementing energy-efficient air handling systems
- In FY2024, we installed solar panels in three more UK centres, with our estate now having 5,918 kWp of solar power, producing 5,020,003 kWh per year
- We continue to negotiate with landlords to add extra solar arrays where possible
- Continuing the roll out of energy efficient Pins on Strings technology, now in 91% of the UK estate
- Our teams have also played their part with our recent travel survey showing a reduction in commuting petrol and diesel miles and an increase in bus usage
Waste, plastics and water
We are committed to enhancing waste reduction and recycling through team member behavioural change incentives, including linking waste management performance to team members’ bonus allocations.
In our UK operations we have increased the percentage of waste recycled in the centres we manage, from 67.3% in FY2019 to 82.9% in FY2024, with all waste diverted from landfill.
We have a strong track record in minimising food and drink wastage, targeting less than 1% of food and drink waste as a percentage of revenue. In FY2024, we achieved 0.6%, demonstrating our progress.
We are committed to changing the way we use, and reuse plastics in line with the three principles of a circular economy for plastics: eliminate, innovate, and circulate. We reduced the amount of plastic in our food and drink packaging by over 61% compared to 2019 and the total weight of food and drink packaging by over 13%.
We are also reducing the amount of water each centre uses – in the UK down from 3.38m³ per centre per day in FY2023 to 3.21m³ in FY2024, but also looking at the wastewater that we emit.
We have now installed grease traps into 84% of centres which reduce the fats and grease emitted from our centres.
Building sustainable centres
Our development teams prioritise sustainability in estate additions and upgrades, partnering with contractors to deliver greener and more efficient buildings.
The challenge to reach net zero intensifies our focus on “building better”, from adopting a re-use, re-cover, and recycle approach to fitting carbon-neutral carpets and 100% recycled vinyl flooring in refurbishments.
All the timber used for refurbishments and new builds is FSC accredited.
For new builds, we fit out all our new centres using 100% renewable energy, adopt a fabric-first approach to enhance energy efficiency and improve EPC ratings, and install technologies that reduce long-term environmental impacts.
Climate change and Net Zero
We were pleased to become a member of the Zero Carbon Forum (ZCF) in FY2024 which is enabling us to better understand our strategy and performance when benchmarked to similar hospitality businesses.
We are also working with ZCF on a number of future carbon reduction initiatives. We have also continued our participation in the UK Hospitality Sustainability Committee.
The Group has made progress this year in further reducing our Scope 1 and 2 intensity ratios in the UK. We are gaining a more accurate understanding of our Scope 3 emissions in the UK with the use of more primary data which has been accessed as a result of our supplier engagement programme.
For the first time we are reporting Scope 3 emissions for our Canadian business which has helped us to establish a baseline as we start to evolve our climate action plan in Canada.
Details of Group climate-related risks and mitigations under TCFD are provided on pages 60 to 69.
Our climate transition plan continues to evolve. It will help guide us on a process of transition over the coming years and is outlined on pages 58 and 59.
Net zero is defined in this report as the point where the Group can reduce its net GHG emissions to zero.
If it is not feasible to completely abate Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions by 2050, the Group will offset residual emissions through actions like carbon removals or ecosystem restoration.
