Introduction

Lancaster University Network Services Limited (LUNS) is a national Telecommunications provider currently based within the Knowledge Business Centre of the Infolab21 building of the Lancaster university campus. The company employs over 30 full-time and/or part-time staff and is a fully owned subsidiary company of Lancaster University.

LUNS is committed to managing the effects that it has on the environment, and to improving, where possible, its environmental performance and impact. The implementation of this Environmental Policy will enable LUNS to ensure its environmental performance.

Our Principles

LUNS recognise that the nature and scale of the company’s activities mean that LUNS will impact on the environment, both locally and globally. We have a responsibility to manage our activities in a way that reduces negative environmental impacts and increases positive impacts.

In order to meet our environmental responsibilities, we will adopt the following principles:-

• Comply with all legal requirements and other environmental requirements to which we subscribe
• Prevent pollution and continually improve our environmental performance
• Be efficient in the use of resources and actively look to increase reuse and recycling of resources whilst continually striving to reduce waste
• Optimise energy efficiency throughout all our product developments, support activities, office infrastructure, staff operation and IT
• Reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and actively endeavour to procure materials from sustainable sources
• Optimise water and paper/printing use efficiency
• Reduce the negative environmental impacts of travel where possible
• Give appropriate consideration to environmental criteria when purchasing products and services
• Incorporate environmental best practice into managed projects/services
• Raise awareness of appropriate environmental issues amongst members of the company, and provide relevant training/guidance to enable conformance to these principles
• Select contractors and suppliers who can demonstrate environmental management and performance in line with this/and their policies
• Work with other organisations to improve the environmental performance of their operations, and support, where possible, relevant research and knowledge transfer
• Use internal audits to monitor compliance with these environmental principles

Responsibilities

The Lancaster University Network Services Board members have overall responsibility for the implementation of this policy. The Technical Director, Mr Jim Mann, will act as the companies Environment and Sustainability Manager and will, where economically viable, put the policy into practice with the support of all members of the company.

The Environment and Sustainability Manager will work with appropriate company members to agree an environmental programme of actions, linked to the delivery of objectives and targets, to be implemented in order to achieve compliance with the principles of the Environmental Policy. The individual actions contained within the environmental programme will be agreed with senior members of staff in the company departments whom will then take responsibility for delivering them. Some cross-functional actions will be the responsibility of the Environment and Sustainability Manager. The overall environmental principles have been approved by the LUNS Board. The environmental programme will be reviewed and updated bi-annually.

The Environment and Sustainability Manager will monitor performance against the environmental programme and the Environmental Policy. The Environmental and Sustainability Manager will report on this performance to the LUNS Board at least once every other calendar year.

Communication

We will communicate this policy to all LUNS staff members, our customers and all contractors working on our behalf. Paper copies will be displayed on notice boards around the company offices and will be available on request from the LUNS Environmental and Sustainability Manager. The policy will be posted on the company’s web site.