Biodiversity
Increasingly, our residents are interested in how their gardens and outdoor space can be used to deliver sustainable projects that can help nature’s recovery.
At the heart of this is biodiversity – which is the variety of plant and animal life in the world or in a particular habitat – we have been working with our residents to deliver biodiversity projects across our care homes.
Most recently, we’ve announced our plans for our Maplewood Court Wildlife Garden!
Projects & Community
We also give back to our local communities by giving our time to local biodiversity projects (funded by Oakland Care). All of our leaders, members of our head office team and people from our local care homes regularly support local initiatives such as woodland tree planting, where in 2022, the group committed to plant 1000 trees.
Woodland Trust
Oakland Care is a corporate member of the The Woodland Trust. We help them to plant and protect trees, bringing the benefits of trees to people, wildlife and the planet.
Many of our homes have created local wildflower gardens and developed areas of land with features especially designed to attract wildlife such as frogs, bats, butterflies, bees and other insects.
By focusing on enhancing biodiversity, we are supporting the following UN Sustainable Development Goal:
15 Life on land
Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss.
– Source: https://sdgs.un.org/goals/goal15
Ambitions & Targets
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1
We are committed to setting science-based targets and becoming carbon net zero.
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2
All of our construction projects to be certified minimum of ‘Excellent’ by BREAAM.
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3
We will achieve Greenmark level 3 accreditation by end of 2022.
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4
We will provide all team members with training on improving sustainability.
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5
We will achieve ISO-14001 accreditation by end of 2023.
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6
We will give back at least 1500 hours of staff time to local communities to volunteer with environmental projects.
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7
We will plant at least 1000 trees per annum.
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8
We will have biodiversity gardens in every home by the end of 2023.
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9
All our new homes will be designed with at least 25% of garden space dedicated to biodiversity from 2023.
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10
We will continue to reduce delivery miles for each home to achieve a total reduction of 50% by end of 2023 (compared to 2021).
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11
We will reduce the volume of clinical waste in each home going to landfill by 50% (2023 vs 2021).
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12
We will reduce plastic waste from chemicals by 90% by end of 2023.
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13
All homes will only use cleaning chemicals that have zero hazardous properties by 2023.
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14
We will only use FSC certified timber for all construction projects.
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15
We will maintain our carbon neutral certification and work towards net zero.
Our Sustainability Journey
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Our Commitment
Caring for the environment and improving sustainability is a key focus for our Executive team.
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Carbon Neutrality
In 2021, Oakland Care became the first UK care home group to be certified as carbon neutral. Discover how we are investing in innovative projects throughout our business to reduce carbon emissions.
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Procurement
We have implemented high sustainability requirements through our tendering processes with suppliers to ensure that the supplies we procure are produced and delivered with a lower level of environmental impact.
See our Responsible Procurement and Reducing Waste Initiative