Menu
YEAR THREE OVERVIEW
We continued to deliver actions to reduce our emissions and build our knowledge in key areas over the last year.
Our annual operational greenhouse gas emissions fell by 14,000 tonnes to 217,000 tonnes CO2e, down 6% from 2021-22 and we are on track to deliver net zero before 2040.
Progress was achieved across all areas of the routemap, delivering actions to eliminate, reduce or capture emissions.
Highlights include:
Developing our knowledge to maximise future opportunities and learning from our experience to date to reduce emissions is an important element of our approach.
This year we had planned several projects to restore peatland. However due to issues with agreeing land entry we were only able to restore 20.6 ha. For this year’s peat and woodland creation programmes we are engaging earlier with tenants and landowners, giving us more time to address their concerns to allow the work to progress.
We surveyed 2094 ha of peat of which we found 615 ha to be in better condition than we first thought. This has allowed us to update our emissions inventory and we have changed how we carry out future surveys, so we capture data better. We initially thought we might have to restore around 4000 ha of poor condition peat on our land but now think it will be around half that. This year we are surveying most of our remaining peatland to understand these emissions better. We have shared the learning on what we are finding with NatureScot and other partners.
Global supply chain issues for key components impacted our energy efficiency and renewables programmes and delivery of new electric vehicles. To minimise the potential impacts, we are placing earlier orders for long lead time items to de-risk these programmes.
As we use more low carbon construction materials, we have realised that we will have to update the emission factors we use for calculating carbon – this is a long term challenge we are working on with our supply chain partners and wider construction sector.
Partnership is vital to achieve the emissions reductions we are committed to.
We have engaged with other major infrastructure businesses in Scotland – Network Rail, Transport Scotland, Scottish Power, SSE and the M Group development – to develop a partner ecosystem to expand the use of low carbon concretes across the country.
With our supply chain partners, we have focussed on the adoption of lower carbon concrete alternatives, sustainable hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) to replace diesel in construction, reduced excavated material being removed from site and low carbon site set up.
With Forestry and Land Scotland, we have developed a 10-year land management plan for Loch Katrine that will capture up to one million tonnes of carbon over 60 years as well as increase biodiversity by up to 40%. It will create 4600 ha of new woodland and restore peatland. Scottish Forestry is currently reviewing the plan for approval.
Scottish Water Horizons has been working with hydrogen producers to explore water supply options for key hydrogen projects. They are exploring potable water supplies and investigating the possible use of water from redundant reservoirs or recovered final effluent from waste water treatment works to ensure they make the most efficient use of Scotland’s precious water resource. The first project for Scottish Power’s Whitelees wind farm south of Glasgow is forecast to start construction later this year.
Scottish Water Horizons are also working in partnership on renewable energy projects. They are developing a hydro project on our assets that will supply renewable energy to an adjacent business. On solar energy we are working in partnership with Strathclyde University to develop a 5MW solar project at Ross Priory on their land to power the raw water pumping station there.
Many of our investment projects are making good progress on reducing emissions, and we plan to do more. To help share knowledge and best practice we established a “Net Zero Heroes” network. This brings together our supply chain partners to share their experiences on “the art of the possible”. This is proving effective at sharing best practices .
We regularly share our learning and experience with the wider public sector through the Sustainable Scotland Network, with the water sector through Water UK and UK Water Industry Research programme projects and through our Hydro Nation Chair and research fellows.
Reducing wastewater process emissions is a global challenge for the water sector. We have worked with other water companies on how to measure these emissions and have installed our first on-site analysers. We have shared learning with Singapore, New Zealand and American companies that has ensured the analysers were installed in the optimum position to monitor these gases. We will continue to engage with the sector to grow our experience in this key area.
Progress was achieved across all areas of the routemap, delivering actions to eliminate, reduce or capture emissions. Highlights include:
Developing our knowledge to maximise future opportunities and learning from our experience to date to reduce emissions is an important element of our approach.
This year we had planned several projects to restore peatland. However due to issues with agreeing land entry we were only able to restore 20.6 ha. For this year’s peat and woodland creation programmes we are engaging earlier with tenants and landowners, giving us more time to address their concerns to allow the work to progress.
We surveyed 2094 ha of peat of which we found 615 Ha to be in better condition than we first thought. This has allowed us to update our emissions inventory and we have changed how we carry out future surveys, so we capture data better. We initially thought we might have to restore around 4000 ha of poor condition peat on our land but now think it will be around half that. This year we are surveying most of our remaining peatland to understand these emissions better. We have shared the learning on what we are finding with NatureScot and other partners.
Global supply chain issues for key components impacted our energy efficiency and renewables programmes and delivery of new electric vehicles. To minimise the potential impacts, we are placing earlier orders for long lead time items to de-risk these programmes.
As we use more low carbon construction materials, we have realised that we will have to update the emission factors we use for calculating carbon – this is a long term challenge we are working on with our supply chain partners and wider construction sector.
Partnership is vital to achieve the emissions reductions we are committed to.
We have engaged with other major infrastructure businesses in Scotland – Network Rail, Transport Scotland, Scottish Power, SSE and the M Group development – to develop a partner ecosystem to expand the use of low carbon concretes across the country.
With our supply chain partners, we have focussed on the adoption of lower carbon concrete alternatives, sustainable hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) to replace diesel in construction, reduced excavated material being removed from site and low carbon site set up.
With Forestry and Land Scotland, we have developed a 10-year land management plan for Loch Katrine that will capture up to one million tonnes of carbon over 60 years as well as increase biodiversity by up to 40%. It will create 4600 ha of new woodland and restore peatland. Scottish Forestry is currently reviewing the plan for approval.
Scottish Water Horizons has been working with hydrogen producers to explore water supply options for key hydrogen projects. They are exploring potable water supplies and investigating the possible use of water from redundant reservoirs or recovered final effluent from waste water treatment works to ensure they make the most efficient use of Scotland’s precious water resource. The first project for Scottish Power’s Whitelees wind farm south of Glasgow is forecast to start construction later this year.
Scottish Water Horizons are also working in partnership on renewable energy projects. They are developing a hydro project on our assets that will supply renewable energy to an adjacent business. On solar energy we are working in partnership with Strathclyde University to develop a 5MW solar project at Ross Priory on their land to power the raw water pumping station there.
Many of our investment projects are making good progress on reducing emissions, and we plan to do more. To help share knowledge and best practice we established a “Net Zero Heroes” network. This brings together our supply chain partners to share their experiences on “the art of the possible”. This is proving effective at sharing best practices.
We regularly share our learning and experience with the wider public sector through the Sustainable Scotland Network, with the water sector through Water UK and UK Water Industry Research programme projects and through our Hydro Nation Chair and research fellows.
Reducing wastewater process emissions is a global challenge for the water sector. We have worked with other water companies on how to measure these emissions and have installed our first on-site analysers. We have shared learning with Singapore, New Zealand and American companies that has ensured the analysers were installed in the optimum position to monitor these gases. We will continue to engage with the sector to grow our experience in this key area.
PROGRESS IN YEAR
During 2022-23 good progress was made across all 4 key strategic activity areas of our routemap:
BECOMING MORE
ENERGY EFFICIENT
Saved 6.8GWh of electricity in our water and waste water services through energy efficiency projects.
Deployed artificial intelligence to optimise water distribution in central Scotland and reduce electricity demand.
Delivered the first phase of one of our major transformation projects at waste water sites to improve control and reduce energy use.
USING LOWER-CARBON
ENERGY PRODUCTS
Installed 7.8GWh pa of solar renewable energy.
Commissioned our largest ever solar panel project at Balmore water treatment works in Glasgow, which will generate 4.4GWh pa of renewable energy to be used on site.
Introduced 79 new electric vehicles and expanded the vehicle charging infrastructure. We now have 171 charge points across Scotland. As we replace our diesel vehicles, we will have over 800 electric vehicles in our fleet.
Reduced fleet mileage through deployment of new digital camera technology, allowing us to avoid home visits and deliver better customer service.
Deployed sustainable hydrotreated vegetable oil (HVO) with 8 of our partners in our investment programme and on 2 sites for standby power generation. This reduces emissions by 90% compared to using diesel.
embracing low
carbon construction
Increased understanding of low carbon construction materials and techniques, piloting their use on projects. Examples include lower carbon concretes, alternative to plastic kiosks and reducing material movements.
All new projects are using low carbon construction site set up and electric plant and hand tools where available.
Where used, low carbon alternatives are typically reducing carbon emissions by 60-80% from conventional approaches.
Through quarterly Net Zero Heroes events with our construction partners, shared best practices to grow understanding with 23 companies round the table.
Built intelligence on the potential costs to deliver net zero construction to inform our long-term investment planning.
Identified opportunities to improve data to assist investment decision-making.
storing away emissions that
cannot be avoided
Restored 20.6 ha of peatland and created 29 ha of new woodland.
Carried out field studies to better understand the condition of peat on our land.
Submitted a 10-year land management plan with Forestry and Land Scotland for the Loch Katrine estate, forecast to save 1 million tonnes of carbon over 60 years.
KEY OBJECTIVES FOR 2023/24
Our Year Four plan is to further increase our rate of delivery and deliver more carbon reduction than was achieved in 2022-23.
We will act across all key strategic goals in our routemap to:
OPERATIONAL CARBON FOOTPRINT 2022/23
GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS BY SOURCE
Our operational greenhouse gas emissions fell to 217,000tCO2e, a 6% reduction from 2021-22.
This is a 53% reduction from our 2006/7 baseline (462,000 tCO2e).
There were increases and decreases across the different carbon footprint categories this year.
The continued greening of the grid coupled with increased energy efficiency and renewables delivery has made a significant contribution to this progress, but at 54% of emissions, electricity remains our biggest source.
At 26% process emissions from waste water treatment are the next biggest source, which is driving much of the focus on innovation and research to minimise these emissions in the future.
The footprint report continues to support the focus set in the routemap for the key emissions we need to eliminate. As in previous years the footprint was verified externally to ISO 14064-1.
PROGRESS UPDATE
Our routemap highlighted key milestones on the way to net zero, covering all aspects of our emissions. These are supported by commitments to a range of actions and activities to build capacity and capability, and to deliver specific goals we would undertake over defined timescales to reach net zero.
Progress across each can be viewed in the sections below.
Electricity consumption remains our largest single source of emissions at 54%. We must reduce our consumption to reduce emissions and deliver financial benefits, while enabling us to support other goals such as generating all the electricity we consume.
GOAL: Reducing our consumption of electricity – Goal 20% by 2040
GOAL: 100% of energy used is our own or hosted renewables by 2040
Process emissions, particularly nitrous oxide (N2O) remain the most challenging area for the water sector to address, requiring a focus on the science, measurement and management of emissions, as well as on technologies to reduce or eliminate the production of emissions.
GOAL: 20% reduction
Reducing our reliance on fossil fuels across all our sites is a key part of getting to net zero.
GOAL: 100% reduction in gas and fuel oil consumption
Key Achievements:
Our fleet travelled 18.4 million miles for business reasons. Our strategy aims to minimise the miles we travel and find zero emissions ways to travel.
GOAL: 50% reduction in the distance we travel
GOAL: 100% Zero Emissions Fleet
We were the first UK water company to include investment emissions as part of our net zero goal. Investment emissions are now our biggest source of emissions each year.
GOAL: 75% reduction in carbon intensity of investment
GOAL: 75% reduction in carbon intensity
Across the 23,219 hectares of our land, we can contribute to the natural, social and economic sustainability of Scotland’s landscape by working to increase carbon storage and biodiversity.
GOAL: Improve carbon dioxide storage on our land to support net zero emissions
Electricity consumption remains our largest single source of emissions at 54%. We must reduce our consumption to reduce emissions and deliver financial benefits, while enabling us to support other goals such as generating all the electricity we consume.
GOAL: Reducing our consumption of electricity – Goal 20% by 2040
GOAL: 100% of energy used is our own or hosted renewables by 2040
Process emissions, particularly nitrous oxide (N2O) remain the most challenging area for the water sector to address, requiring a focus on the science, measurement and management of emissions, as well as on technologies to reduce or eliminate the production of emissions.
GOAL: 20% reduction
Reducing our reliance on fossil fuels across all our sites is a key part of getting to net zero.
GOAL: 100% reduction in gas and fuel oil consumption
Key Achievements:
Our fleet travelled 18.4 million miles for business reasons. Our strategy aims to minimise the miles we travel and find zero emissions ways to travel.
GOAL: 50% reduction in the distance we travel
GOAL: 100% Zero Emissions Fleet
We were the first UK water company to include investment emissions as part of our net zero goal. Investment emissions are now our biggest source of emissions each year.
GOAL: 75% reduction in carbon intensity of investment
GOAL: 75% reduction in carbon intensity
Across the 23,219 hectares of our land, we can contribute to the natural, social and economic sustainability of Scotland’s landscape by working to increase carbon storage and biodiversity.
GOAL: Improve carbon dioxide storage on our land to support net zero emissions
ENABLERS
We cannot achieve our ambitious goals alone and we assume that required future investment funding is available. On our journey to net zero there are some key enabling activities which we have progressed in the last year.
PEOPLE
CUSTOMERS AND COMMUNITIES
PROCUREMENT
GOVERNANCE
POLICY AND REGULATION
INNOVATION
LOW ENERGY WATER
AND WASTE WATER
TREATMENT,
AMMONIA AND
METHANE RECOVERY
DIGITAL AND
ANALYTIC TOOLS
MATERIALS
RESEARCH
WATER FOR
HYDROGEN
PRODUCTION
Exemplar Waste Water Treatment Works
Our Exemplar Waste Water Treatment Works transformation project has installed real time control improvements and final effluent monitoring at 16 of our largest sites to reduce energy use and manage compliance risk along with condition monitoring of key equipment to give advance warning of mechanical problems that could impact service.
So far over 1GW of energy has been saved and this will increase as the control systems are optimised.
AQUADVANCE
This transformation project is optimising the operations of our largest water distribution network in central Scotland, controlling service reservoir levels and saving 2 GW of energy use through the use of advanced analytic software.
CARBON CURE
We have piloted the use of a novel low carbon concrete that reduces the amount of cement needed in concrete production by injecting CO2 into the concrete mixture to reduce emissions.
SUPPLYING WATER FOR HYDROGEN
Scottish Water Horizons are developing 25 projects across Scotland to design and deliver water supplies that will enable 6.8GW of hydrogen production. The first of these at Whitelees for Scottish Power will start construction in later this year.
WASTEWATER ANAEROBIC TREATMENT TRIAL
We have developed a design for the anaerobic treatment of waste water and have installed a pilot reactor at our Denny waste water treatment works.
This will undergo a year long trial to test its effectiveness under a range of operating conditions. If successful, we will look to scale up the technology. This technology offers the potential for a waste water treatment works to not only be low energy but also to generate all the energy it consumes.
FLOW ENERGY
To help reduce energy consumption across our 2500 sewage pumping stations, we have developed a tool called Flow Energy which uses energy consumption data and digital algorithms to identify potential issues.
This enables local teams to investigate sooner and put in place interventions to prevent service failure and reduce excess energy demand.
So far this has been deployed to over 1,400 sewage pumping stations, providing weekly reports to team leaders from across the country and could help save around 5% of energy demand in waste water pumping over the coming years.
CEMFREE / ROAD
BINDER TRIALS
At Daldowie Waste Water Treatment Works
we have trialled a low carbon concrete alternative called Cemfree.
This can be used in place of cement to from a concrete with up to 80% less embodied carbon. With our delivery partners, we are looking at how we might make greater use of this type of material.
At Biggar Water Treatment Works, we worked
with McKenzie Construction to resurface an 800 metre section of access road by using a binder called ecoProactive to stabilise the existing surface. This process was cheaper than tarmacking the road and eliminated the need for quarrying and delivering new materials.
HYDROGEN FROM
FINAL EFFLUENT
Working with Cranfield University, we are studying the role of hydrogen in reducing carbon emissions in the industry.
This study looks at the technologies and processes available to produce hydrogen and what role these can play in reducing emissions.
INTRODUCTION
TRANSFORMATION
ELECTRICITY
PROCESS
EMISSIONS
GAS &
FUEL OIL
TRANSPORT
& TRAVEL
INVESTMENT
STORING
CARBON
This year we achieved a key milestone for our plans to improve carbon capture and biodiversity at Loch Katrine, the source of water for Greater Glasgow. We have been working closely with Forestry and Land Scotland to prepare a 10-year land management plan for the 9500 ha estate around the loch and this has now been submitted to Scottish Forestry for approval.
The plan looks at how we increase tree cover and biodiversity and focuses on natural regeneration using Scottish native trees including birch, rowan, oak and alder. This approach has a minimal impact on the catchment and water quality. We will also be restoring peatland at the site.
The project is set to deliver a 40% increase in biodiversity on the estate and capture nearly a million tonnes of carbon over the next 60 years.
Scottish Water installs many glass reinforced plastic kiosks on its assets to house a wide variety of equipment- from chemical dosing skids to electrical panels. There is a high carbon content in the kiosk- often more than the equipment in the kiosk. Two of our construction partners have been exploring alternative low carbon materials. Three new kiosk types have now been designed and built with low carbon materials and we are starting to deploy them on projects. One is made from recycled plastic bottles, one is made from engineered timber and the third is made from light gauge steel. The carbon reduction ranges from 60 to 85%, depending on the material used and the security rating of the kiosk. As well as being used by Scottish Water, other utility companies are also looking to use them on their projects.
Scottish Water has established a framework for the supply of sustainably sourced hydrotreated vegetable oil that can be used by both Scottish Water and its construction partners. It’s a drop in fuel replacement that reduces emissions by 90% compared to conventional diesel.
Over the last year it has been widely adopted by our construction partners, displacing diesel use in excavators, cranes and other heavy plant. It is also being used to fuel generators to provide power for remote construction sites.
On our water mains rehabilitation programme its adoption is expected to reduce emissions by nearly 30%.
