Sustainability

On a day to day basis the club’s Lead for Environment and Sustainability is Dave Farebrother, who is  a member of the Senior Leadership Team.  Dave is a Chartered Environmentalist with a MSc in Environmental Management, he is also an experienced Chartered Energy Manager and is a Fellow of the Energy Institute and a member of IEMA.

Dave is assisted in his environmental role by Liam McSherry.

We are signatures to the EFL’s Green Club’s scheme and, after our initial assessment last year, are working through an improvement plan aimed at achieving the threshold score early in 2024 and becoming one of the first clubs to be accredited under the scheme.

We are are signatures to the Green Mark scheme for local businesses set up recently by the London Borough of Sutton.

NET ZERO

• We have pledged through the Green Mark Scheme to become Net Zero by 2050.

• We have also pledged to reduce our carbon footprint to 50% of our baseline (2021/22) by 2035.

• We report publicly on our energy usage and carbon footprint for Scopes 1,2 & 3 within our wider CSR report. The report for 2021-22 can be found here and the 2022-23 report is here.

We have an environmental management system in place aligned to ISO:14001

Carbon Reduction Initiatives.  Since 2014 we have:-

• Replaced the original windows in our main function room (built as an extension to our clubhouse in 1973) with double glazing.

• Replaced the men’s urinals here with waterless urinals

• Removed the radiators from this function room and from our boardroom and replaced them with low carbon electric heat pumps. This enabled us to decommission one of our two gas boilers

• The changing room showers were previously fed from a calorifier served by heat from a gas boiler, these have been replaced by electric point of use showers.

• Our stadium floodlights have been replaced by a modern LED system, not only low energy but also very low in terms of light spillage (reducing neighbourhood nuisance)

• Around 50% of our spectator lighting in the stadium is now LED and the rest will be changed as part of ongoing redevelopment works

• Around 95% of our internal space lighting has been changed to LEDs

• Our electricity contract is scheduled to change to a green tariff in December this year

• We operate an Energy Management System aligned to ISO:50001, with monthly M&T reports to the board

Travel – Sutton United Travel Plan

• Players travel to away games as a group, either by train or coach.

• We have one company vehicle, previously a diesel van but now upgraded to a cleaner, low carbon hybrid vehicle and with plans to change to a fully electric EV vehicle.

• We have installed a high-speed EV Charging point in our car park that is available within the club and to the wider  community.

• We encourage players to car-share when travelling to home games

• There is no general spectator parking at our home ground but we have a covered sheffield-type bike rack for spectator use.

• We are an official hub for the Forest e-bike cycle hire scheme.

• A Spectator Travel Plan can be downloaded here

Miscellaneous

• We moved from local authority waste collection to Biffa to maximise recycling and minimise landfill

• We do not have any single-use plastics in our bar or refreshment outlets

• We produce a quarterly sustainability newsletter  – SUNS. All issues can be found at the top of the page

• We have an ongoing energy management campaign, with circulation to all staff and volunteers by email

• We have installed two collection points outside the  stadium for vape recycling

• We took part in the EFL’s 2023 Green Clubs weekend. One of the actions we took for this was for us to visit three local schools to talk about climate change and sustainability at their assemblies, this reached 600-700 pupils.We are currently planning our involvement for this event in 2024

• We delivered a Climate Fresk training session at the club  (www.climatefresk.org)
• We have partnered with Our Bike and LB of Sutton to acquire a branded electric cargo bike for use around the borough by staff and the wider community.
• We are planning two presentations to our academy players on Football & Sustainability, with a focus on how climate change will impact the sport
• An accessible series of guides to live more sustainably: https://www.ganddee.com/blog/categories/guides
• An accessible series of tips to live more sustainably: https://www.ganddee.com/blog/categories/tips
• A growing glossary of sustainability-related terms: https://www.ganddee.com/glossary