Water

We need to act now to minimise our water footprint as water is increasingly becoming scarce in many parts of the world.

We have made significant progress in our Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region, where water is a particularly valuable resource, and we have undertaken water audits on our projects to identify reduction options.

This resulted in us setting up water monitoring procedures and arranging training in four languages to raise employee and contractor awareness. The average water use in MENA during 2010 was 1,325 litres per person per month.

Each of our MENA sites has a water champion and we are incorporating water-saving taps and waterless urinals in our head office and our projects including the Abu Dhabi Investment Council headquarters.

Saving water with ‘Rippleffect’

Teams from Carillion Planned Maintenance and Facilities Management worked with our client, AXA, on a ‘Rippleffect’ water saving project, in their Basingstoke office. This is a Waste and Resources Action Plan (WRAP) initiative to help businesses conserve water. So far, much of the work has concentrated on assessing water use within the building in order to reduce it.

At another of AXA’s sites, passive infra-red (PIR) controls were installed on the urinals to activate the flushing mechanism only when someone approached. Measurements before and after installation show a saving of 4.7 m³ of water per week.

We are considering implementing this technology more widely, rolling out employee communications and sharing best practice across the business.