Sustainability practices adopted by Kingspan Insulated Panels across its global operations are keeping the company on track to become a Net Zero Energy business by 2020.
Kingspan’s 2015 Sustainability Report, Walk the Talk – Our Responsibility and Performance discloses the sustainability practices put in place by the company for its operations in Australasia, Western Europe and the United Arab Emirates between 2012 and 2014. The third party report also maps the company’s progress towards the goal of running all facilities entirely on renewable power by 2020, an initiative embarked upon in 2011 by its parent company, the Kingspan Group.
Observing that sustainability is at the core of Kingspan’s agenda, Dr Mark Tatum, technical director at Kingspan Insulated Panels Australia comments that the findings in the report prove the company’s commitment to best practice within its own operations and the broader construction industry.
According to Dr Tatum, Kingspan Insulated Panels expects to exceed its interim target of running 50 per cent of all global facilities on renewable power by 2016, despite increased production levels and major acquisitions. The company is combining research, product innovation and training to help reduce its energy bills and environmental footprint.
At the local level, Kingspan continues to engage with customers and stakeholders to construct energy efficient buildings. For instance, Kingspan completed the construction of a rooftop solar PV project in 2015 at the IKEA Tempe Store in New South Wales. Considered the single largest installation of its kind in Australia at the time, the solar power system helped the retailer realise their ambition to be environmentally sustainable.
Key Australian initiatives also include energy modelling for both specific projects and generic building types to help customers using Kingspan products find ways to optimise energy usage; and providing life cycle assessment and environmental product declarations for its products at the building design stage to support whole-of-life building impact assessments.
The 2015 Sustainability Report outlines global initiatives that bring new thinking and major innovations to customers in the construction industry; these include research on new building techniques and holistic design principles for the development of high performance, energy-saving buildings.
The report also highlighted several achievements including the fact that over 34% of energy used by Kingspan Insulated Panels in 2014 came from renewable sources, and a total of 15 Gigawatt hours (GWh) was saved across global operations through the use of renewable energy between 2013 and 2014. During the reporting period, four per cent of total water usage came from rainwater harvesting; 32,147 tonnes of material were recycled; and carbon emissions were reduced by almost 50 per cent, helping parent company Kingspan Group get listed on the CDP Climate A List.
Kingspan Insulated Panels has reported in accordance with the GRI framework to a B+ standard.
Dr Tatum concludes that Kingspan Insulated Panels Australia will continue to support the Kingspan Group’s Net Zero Energy target through ongoing investment in renewable energy across its sites. The company also remains committed to the sharing of knowledge and best practices to advance the development of high performance, energy-saving buildings within the construction industry.
Image: Kingspan Energi Centre
