- 8. Client focus: Anglian Water
20 years of embedding net zero in the water asset lifecycle
Decarbonisation schemes within plans submitted to Ofwat for funding in the water industry’s eighth Asset Management Plans, which will run from 2025 to 2030, are the result of 20 years of cross-sector collaboration.
David Riley, who is head of carbon neutrality at Anglian Water, told the Carbon Crunch audience that the efforts made over the last two decades have delivered a better understanding of the asset base in the water industry. He added that they have created insight into where carbon is emitted within water infrastructure and the actions the sector needs to take. “We have come together as a sector to understand, agree the approaches that we need to take and send clear signals and requests to our supply chain,” he added.
Strategy and collaboration that drives consistency
“The need for carbon management was first recognised by the water industry in 2004 with the understanding that there was a need to start taking action,” he said. “The technologies and our knowledge have evolved significantly since then.”
In 2006 the Carbon Accounting Workbook was first developed with water industry regulator Ofwat, the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and stakeholders. “What that workbook did was give consistency: an approach of how we report our emissions and understand where those emissions are,” explained David.
“That workbook is still going on today. It's updated and renewed on an annual basis and I see it as the real foundation of how we've built our plan.”
The industry has also collaborated to undertake research and create a series of reports that define how the sector measures whole life carbon, understands process emissions and reviewed “how we now know the unknowns”. David explained that access to this work is available from the UK Water Industry Research website.
David added: “In 2020, water companies in England and Wales came together to launch the net zero route map, which is currently being updated. But that initial document gave the industry as a whole the strategies and actions we need to take collectively and consistently to deliver against this massive challenge.
“Ofwat has also released a net zero technology report, which has given guidance to the industry in terms of which technologies they think we should be adopting and investing in to drive us forward.”
Collaboration across the industry may have been key to driving the progress made over the last 20 years but David underlined the need for greater urgency going forward.
Moving from piloting to business as usual much faster
He said that climate and energy expert and former chief executive of the Climate Change Committee Chris Stark, who is now leading DESNZ’s clean energy mission control, spoke at an Anglian Water event last year. Chris told Anglian Water that “reaching net zero is the point where we stop damaging the planet”. “I've been working in this space for over 20 years and that was impactful on me,” explained David.
“We always talk about should we have a target for 2040? Should we have a target for 2050? But actually that removes the urgency that we have to take action today, because if 2050 is the point when we stop damaging the planet, that means that over the next 25 years, we will continue to do so.
“This isn't about looking at those future targets and thinking we don't need to do much until we get to that point: that's the end goal. In fact, we should be trying to pull that forward and through our collective leadership in this space, we really need to think more about how we set those targets and commitments out.”
David called on the construction and infrastructure industry to align to and implement the standard for carbon management PAS 2080, set ambitious long-term targets on the path to net zero, challenge on carbon and cost across the supply chain and push collectively for influence on government and regulators.
“We're already seeing climate change – in 2022 we saw the highest ever temperatures recorded in the UK and we’re seeing extensive rainfall and flooding events,” David concluded. “There's an opportunity here. We know what we need to do, now it is a case of spending money in the right way to deliver the innovations and the low carbon solutions that we need. We must move from piloting new materials and ideas to making them business as usual much faster.”
