Sustainability Report 2006/07Our sustainability approach
Sustainable Water – A Strategic Framework formalises Melbourne Water’s commitment to sustainability and outlines our sustainability principles.
It also links our work to Victorian Government strategies and policies including Our Water Our Future, Our Environment Our Future, the Central Region Sustainable Water Strategy and Melbourne 2030 Metropolitan Strategy.
The framework provides the context for Melbourne Water’s planning process, ensuring that economic, environmental and social impacts are considered.
The framework was developed by Melbourne Water’s Board and senior management team with input from our people, and consultation with government, water industry and community stakeholders.
In 2006/07, we added goals relating to community engagement, and energy use and greenhouse emissions to reflect the importance of these issues to our business.
Our sustainability principles
Melbourne Water’s commitment to sustainability will be demonstrated by:
- Protecting and conserving Melbourne’s water resources
- Protecting and improving the environment, including biodiversity
- Our leadership, scientific research, creativity and innovation
- Ensuring responsible risk management
- Sharing information and fostering collaborative working relationships
- Maintaining long-term financial viability
- Contributing to the health of the community
- Demonstrating corporate social responsibility
- Ensuring intergenerational equity by considering short-term and long-term implications in all decision making
- Providing an environment where employees are encouraged to achieve their potential.
Sustainability Improvement Plan
Melbourne Water has prepared a draft Sustainability Improvement Plan to identify opportunities for sustainability improvement. The plan identifies sustainability initiatives in key areas aligned with Melbourne Water’s strategic direction. These initiatives are included in our 2007/08 – 2009/10 Corporate Plan and Draft 2008 Water Plan.
Statement of Obligations
Our Statement of Obligations to the Minister for Water now contains sustainability management principles that mirror those in the Water (Governance) Act 2006, which was proclaimed on 1 July 2007.
These principles are:
- The need to ensure that water resources are conserved and properly managed for sustainable use and for the benefit of present and future generations
- The need to encourage and facilitate community involvement in the making and implementation of arrangements relating to the use, conservation and management of water resources
- The need to integrate both long-term and short-term economic, environmental, social and equitable considerations
- The need for the conservation of biological diversity and ecological integrity to be a fundamental consideration
- If there are threats of serious or irreversible environmental damage, lack of full scientific certainty as to measures to address the threat should not be used as a reason for postponing such measures.
Melbourne Water Planning Framework and how sustainability is incorporated
The Statement of Obligations also requires Melbourne Water to develop and implement programs for assessing, monitoring and continuously improving our sustainability performance, including:
- Responding to climate change
- Maintaining and restoring natural assets
- Using resources more efficiently
- Managing everyday environmental impacts.
Melbourne Water has developed initiatives in each of these key areas and included these in our 2007/08 – 2009/10 Corporate Plan and Draft 2008 Water Plan.
(See Corporate governance and risk management).
How we rate
Melbourne Water’s sustainability performance was benchmarked against publicly listed companies considered to be world leaders in sustainability. According to the Dow Jones Sustainability World Indexes that consider economic, environmental and social criteria, Melbourne Water performed well in 2005/06 against other Australian utilities and global water utilities. This was the most recent assessment as of 30 June 2007. Areas for potential improvement are being identified and followed up.
Sustainability initiatives
Melbourne Water introduced several new sustainability initiatives this year, including policies and guidelines to encourage better sustainability outcomes in Melbourne Water projects. The most significant initiative was the adoption of triple bottom line guidelines to ensure that a more formal and consistent approach is taken to considering environmental, social and economic impacts for our projects (see Our business).
These initiatives included establishing a sustainable purchasing policy and becoming a member of ECO-Buy, a sustainable purchasing organisation funded through the Victorian Government.
We also began reviewing Melbourne Water properties as part of our Sustainable Sites program. We identified several areas for improvement, including water and energy efficiency. Initiatives to deliver these improvements will be introduced in 2007/08 (see Our people, our workplace).
The LivingSmart program, which began in June 2006, is designed to encourage our people to think about sustainability issues and make changes in the workplace and at home.
LivingSmart resulted in significant behaviour change among our people. In a random survey of Melbourne Water employees, 89% of those questioned said that their behaviour (in a sustainability sense) had changed for the better through the influence of the program (see Our people, our workplace).
This behaviour change was also demonstrated through ecological footprint calculations that our people voluntarily completed in June 2006 and again in June 2007. The average respondent footprint reduced from 6.9 to 6.3 global hectares per person.
The way forward
Significant opportunities exist to harness employee awareness and commitment to sustainability created by LivingSmart to further improve sustainability outcomes.
From next year, our intention is to concentrate on the major impacts of Melbourne Water’s business by paying more attention to the supply chain and our infrastructure projects, especially as more people become familiar with using the triple bottom line guidelines.
Melbourne Water has established several Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to measure sustainability performance and these will take effect from 2007/08. These KPIs include office-based impacts such as energy, water and paper use, and waste to landfill. Targets for the next six years were established and approved by the Board and will also feed into employees’ enterprise agreements.