If enough people do a small thing it ends up being a big thing. By encouraging each of our 112,000 employees worldwide to do what they can to save energy, we’re taking a massive step towards achieving our ambitious carbon emission target. Have you switched off your PC?

Leading the way in carbon reduction is environmentally responsible and gives us a key business advantage – customers, governments and employees want companies to play their part in tackling climate change.

Having already reduced our CO2 emissions by 58% since 1996, we’re aiming for an 80% reduction by 2016. It’s an enormous task. While major initiatives like our ‘green energy’ contract will have a big impact, to reach our target we must lower our energy consumption considerably, and that means galvanising the whole company. Donna Young, BT’s head of climate change, explains, “It has to get into the DNA of the company. We’re getting everyone from the top down behind the programme, to make it successful.”

Small things count. Turning off lights, recycling paper, a day working from home, printing double-sided – make a massive difference. For example, everyone switching off their PC monitors at night will save BT £500,000 per year.

And last year we saved 97,000 tonnes of CO2 and about £240m by using video and teleconferencing to reduce travel to meetings.
We asked 400 BT people worldwide and from all divisions whether and how they wanted to be involved. Donna says, “We wanted to find out what would work and how to catch people’s imagination.”

Three things came out clearly. People wanted a programme that was fun and creative. They wanted to be able to involve family and friends. And while they didn’t need financial incentives, they wanted recognition and visibility for their projects.

Armed with this feedback we launched www.bt.com/climatechange, comprising an internal and external website that people inside and outside BT can get involved in. The site raises awareness, but is also fun, with something for everyone. There’s an ‘Easy guide’ and an ‘Enthusiasts guide’ and thought leaders offer recommendations from groundbreaking books as well as a Ministry of Sound music video. A diverse media mix on the site includes ‘vox pops’ and Intrigue 2016, a murder mystery game where players solve the secrets of climate change.

Also originating from feedback was BT Carbon Clubs – small groups of like-minded individuals who work together to reduce BT’s and/or their personal carbon footprints. Aldershot Carbon Busters helps recycle batteries while the Eco Homeworkers club shares large paper orders. BT supports clubs financially but also tasks senior managers with sponsoring the wealth of ideas generated. There are now 87 clubs including four in Europe, and one in India, the US and Australia.

On 14 September 2007, we launched our own Living Lightly Day and Live Lightly website. We are encouraging people to pledge small changes which make a positive difference, from buying fruit and vegetables loose to using stairs instead of lifts. We’re delighted we now have over 9,000 pledges.

The Creative Challenge answered requests for creativity. This competition, open to all BT people and students from the London College of Communication, encouraged creative communication of climate change issues and attracted over 130 entries. Thirty shortlisted finalists included songs, animation, computer games and marketing campaigns – such was the standard, BT is taking seven forward.

Our employee consultation triggered many other initiatives: from removing office bins and installing recycling stations, to a monthly online newsletter, exclusive invitations for Carbon Clubbers and the development of an ‘Ideas Bank’.

Is the programme working? Donna answers, “Definitely. It’s early days but the encouragement we get, the activities going on and the ideas coming out are fantastic. People are initiating change themselves and encouraging others to do the same.”