10:10: How Woking is really working

The 10:10 campaign wants businesses, individuals, organisations and educational bodies to cut their carbon emissions by 10% in a year. Here's how Woking borough council did it
Duncan Graham-Rowe
guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 1 September 2009 09.30 BST
When it comes to reducing CO2 emissions in the public sector it's hard to find any other organisation as progressive as Woking borough council. At a time when many organisations are still wondering where to begin Woking has nearly two decades of experience, having first commenced its climate change and sustainability initiatives as far back as 1992 following the Rio Earth summit.
Since then by 2008 it had successfully reduced its energy consumption by 31% and CO2 emissions by 29% of 1990 levels. And by generating much of its own energy, 2% of this now comes from renewable sources and 41% from sustainable means.
This was made possible because in 1999 Woking took the radical step of setting up its own utility company Thameswey Energy. This council-owned non-profit company is charged with providing sustainable energy to the council and other organisations within the Woking area, for example, through the use of combined heat and power (CHP) generators, photovoltaic (PV) solar farms (solar panels that generate electricity) and a fuel cell CHP facility. This is currently being tested as the power and heat source for the local swimming pool.
According John Thorp, managing director of Thameswey, at one stage Woking had 90% of all PV capacity in the UK, and currently has about 500 1KW peak PV cells spread out over 13 different locations. There is also a 1.3MW CHP facility in the centre of Woking, and 14 more across the borough. "We have our own hard-wired grid in the town centre," says Thorp. This supplies electricity and heating to council buildings as well as hotels and leisure centres.
"Within the wider borough we have a virtual grid system with small CHP units in buildings outside the central business district," says Thorp. Initially the idea was to sell excess energy back into the grid, but the amount private energy companies are willing to pay for it was so poor that the virtual grid was created to share this excess amongst council owned buildings.
It's a sustainability drive that runs throughout the council, says Thorp, with movement detectors in all its buildings, to ensure lights aren't left on, and waterless urinals in all the men's toilets. Waste vehicles are powered by LNG gas and there is a big push to make council cars more efficient. "The council's fleet of company cars have upper limits on the CO2 they produce," says Thorp. Currently this is 160g of CO2 per kilometre, but this will soon go down further to 130g CO2/km.
Similarly the town's car parks, which are all council owned, penalise polluting cars and reward cleaner ones, with a 25% additional levy placed on any annual season tickets for cars producing more 160g CO2/km and 25% less if it's under 130g CO2/km, while electric vehicles get to park for free. And all of this is monitored by a licence plate recognition system.
And thanks to a deal struck with a car hire company in the town centre, which allows low-carbon cars to be hired on an hourly basis, employees are encouraged to leave their cars at home. Instead a network of dedicated cycle paths is designed to make it easier to cycle to work by ensuring that no one is ever more than 750 metres away from a bike lane, a measure that recently earned the council a £2m Cycle Town grant.
Indeed this sort of achievement, along with the financial benefits it can bring, is also helping to drive Woking's sustainability initiatives, says Thorpe. In the first year the council was able to save £250,000. After that, he says, there was no looking back.
CO2 reductions on 1990 levels
Energy – 31%
Electricity – Not known
Transport – Not known
Measures
Combined heating and power stations, photovoltaics and fuel cells. Light sensors, waterless urinals and low-carbon vehicle reward schemes. Bike lanes and hire cars that can be rented by the hour.