Berkeley Group

Source: Construction Digital

Date :07/05/2008 14:02:08

Exec looks at how the Berkeley Group’s strategy has changed in the face of government targets for new homes and sustainability

Written by Lucy Mowatt and Produced by Nicholas Davies

Established in 1976 with the aim of developing one-off, executive housing to residents in Surrey and the South East, the Berkeley Group has certainly grown and expanded.

Having been listed on the London Stock Exchange since 1985, the Group is now made up of six companies, each with its own unique focus on the construction industry; Berkeley Homes, St George and St James primarily focus on large scale, mixed use urban regeneration schemes in London and the South East; Berkeley First, seeks to develop key worker and student housing; Berkeley Commercial Developments, deals with commercial land and finally Berkeley Strategic Land, deals with sensitive communities and environments to produce sympathetic developments.

With the government’s aim to build three million more sustainable and affordable homes by 2010, alongside the target to achieve carbon-zero homes by 2016, the companies within the Berkeley Group have developed a number of strategies that will help meet these aims. This has culminated in the launch of the Group’s industry leading and externally praised ‘Seven Sustainability Commitments’, aimed primarily at reducing energy, water and waste from its developments and operations. The commitments include ensuring that all Berkeley sites seeking planning permission after January 1, 2008 will commit to certifying all new homes (excluding refurbishments) to Level 3 of the Code for Sustainable Homes.

Phillip Sellwood, Chief Executive of the Energy Saving Trust described the Berkeley Group’s Sustainability Commitments as leading by example. He said: “Not only does this set a precedent for all other volume developers to follow, but it also sends out the right messages to home buyers.”

In a recent press release, the Berkeley Group said: “As a pioneer of urban regeneration, Berkeley is committed to making significant, long term contributions to the environmental, social and economic fabric of the communities in which the Group works.”

And it is certainly doing all it can to achieve that.

Sustainability

To give a broad overview, the Berkeley Group is not only seeking to reduce the impact of its developments upon the environment, but it also wants to minimise the impact the companies themselves have on their surroundings.

The Group has committed to reducing the environmental impact of its developments, as well as its levels of waste, while also “ensuring that over 95 percent of completed development is on brownfield land.” This will reduce the need to build on other green sites whilst regenerating previously redundant areas and boosting local economies. In fact, in 2007, one hundred percent of the Group’s developments fulfilled this remit, exceeding its target.

The Group has also signed up to the NextGeneration Benchmark of Sustainable Housebuilders, which is guided by Insight Investment, WWF UK, the Housing Corporation and UpStream, in order to get feedback on its operations, reporting methods and ways to improve. In terms of its approach to sustainable development and business operation, the Group ranked higher than 20 other publicly owned construction companies.

The initiative strives to deliver best practice to the industry by gaining feedback regarding sustainability and meeting government targets. Indeed, the Autumn 2007 report found that whilst developers recognised that climate change would have an impact upon their business, there was still a lot to be achieved.

“None [of the companies involved] have a climate change policy in place; only 25 percent have an understanding of the carbon footprint of their operations; and only 15 percent have sustainable procurement policies,” the report states.

The Berkeley Group immediately responded to this information, issuing a number of policy statements, outlining the moves being made to improve its own processes and have a positive effect upon climate change.

Sustainable procurement

The Berkeley Group has tackled the issue of a sustainable supply chain head on, with a number of definite policies. One of the most significant is the remit that, where possible, companies within the Group look to use timber that has been certified as coming from managed and sustainable source; the Group can then satisfy future homebuyers that sustainability has been a priority when building.

This falls within the remit of a wider Sustainable Procurement Policy, whereby the Berkeley Group gives preference to those suppliers that have sourced their products sustainably and ethically. The Group looks to use companies that have been certified to environmental standards, such as ISO 14001, and those that can prove that products and services are ethically sourced.

This approach also extends to working only with those suppliers who have a high standard of employee health and safety, like its own. “The Berkeley Group Holdings plc recognises that safety is synonymous with quality. Since we are committed to achieving excellence through continuous improvement, it follows that minimising risk of injury to people and damage to equipment and products is inseparable from our overall objectives,” states the company’s policy document.

The Group has established a reporting procedure for health and safety, encouraging individuals to report any problems, and also has a whistle-blowing policy in place in order to ensure that there is transparency in the company’s operations. By ensuring that the workforce and those associated with the Berkeley Group are safe, the company can safeguard its future and also avoid unnecessary lost time. The Group achieved an average RIDDOR (Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences Regulations 1995) incident rate of 7.2 per 1,000 employees compared to the House Builder Federation all builder average of 10.7 in 2007.

Carbon Footprint

By aiming to reduce and even remove its carbon footprint, the Group has implemented a green office management scheme, whereby all employees are encouraged to take responsibility for their actions, not just those on the building sites.

Alongside reducing carbon emissions of the homes it builds by 25 percent and water consumption by 30percent - part of the Level 3 certification of the Code for Sustainable Homes - the Group has also committed to reducing its direct carbon emissions (associated with its offices, sites and car fleet) and direct water consumption (associated with its offices and sites) by 20 percent.

“The overall aim of our Green Office Management policy is to create the right conditions for our employees to become more efficient in their everyday working patterns,” the Group states. By installing energy efficient lighting, recycling waste and reducing water consumption, the company has looked at all areas in order to reduce its impact on the environment. As well as procuring more environmentally friendly materials to build with, the Group also seeks to use chlorine-free recycled paper in its offices.

This is in addition to encouraging all employees to look at green transportation, highlighting the benefit of walking or cycling to work. Berkeley has also invested in hybrid company cars, with car sharing encouraged, to reduce the overall impact of the business on the environment.

Product life cycle

As if that wasn’t enough, the Berkeley Group seeks to ensure that homebuyers are also aware of how to make the most of their homes, and their green capabilities. For example, Berkeley Homes produces a brochure which outlines the ways in which homeowners can all make minor changes to their lifestyles in order to have a “huge impact on the planet’s future”.

Broken down into sections including energy efficiency, reducing emissions and respecting nature, the brochure communicates how homebuyers can have an active role in changing the way they live.

In addition, the Berkeley Homes website has substantial amounts of information about what home owners can do to minimise their impact on the environment, with an online interactive tool designed to highlight the sustainable features of their homes and developments. The site also affords access to the Group’s policies on the environment.

With such all-encompassing strategies in place to meet NextGeneration benchmarks and really make an impact on climate change and the environment, Berkeley has received a number of awards for its efforts. The Group has just been awarded a Queen’s Award for Enterprise in the sustainable development category and currently holds the Sustainable Housebuilder of the Year title, which it has won two years running at the Sustainability Awards; it has also maintained its listing in the FTSE 4 Good Index.

By continuously trying to meet these standards and encouraging homebuyers, suppliers and partners to do the same, the Group looks set to meet its own and government targets regarding sustainability.

Click here to view the corporate brochure on Berkley Group