A UK garden centre has unveiled an ambitious plan to significantly reduce its carbon footprint and help the environment.
Somerset’s award-winning Sanders GardenWorld are proposing ‘carbon neutrality by 2010’, having pledged to significantly reduce its carbon footprint and invest in more recycling and purchasing initiatives to benefit the environment.
Managing director of the Brent Knoll garden centre, Peter Burks, explained: “We take our carbon emissions very seriously and are keen to develop our environmental policies further during the coming three years. We already recycle water, paper and plastics and have recently won three major national awards for our recycling programmes, beating off competition from the likes of supermarket giant Tesco, High Street retailers the Acardia Group and homeware experts Habitat.”
From March 14, the garden centre has pledged to reduce the number of ‘plant miles’ it is notching up by reducing the distance plants travel and therefore cutting back on the energy required to deliver them to the garden centre.
“We are looking at buying more plants from nurseries in the south west and increasing our local suppliers by 50-75% by the end of this year,” Burks added. “Buying local and supporting the local economy is just as important with regards to plants as it is food and reducing food miles. ‘Plant miles’ is a new concept we have developed.”
Since opening, Sanders GardenWorld has been dedicated to recycling rain and waste water. It has its own water system, which collects rain water, re-filters it and stores it ready to use for watering the centre’s plants. This is also used for the main water fountains, which form the centrepiece for its outdoor plant area.
The site has been committed to recycling cardboard since March 2001, plastic recycling was introduced in September 2001 and from January 2006 the garden centre began recycling glass. To date thousands of gallons of water have been re-used and more than 250 tonnes of cardboard have been recycled.
Sanders also pledges to plant around 80 native trees every year at the garden centre or within a Woodland Trust designated area in Somerset, to offset the miles travelled by its delivery vehicles.
From March 14 the garden centre will also be looking at auditing its energy use and carbon emissions, as well as its policies regarding stock and plant miles.
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