Bold steps to assess Orion’s carbon footprint

Media release – for immediate release
29 June 2009

Bold steps to assess Orion’s carbon footprint

Central Canterbury electricity network Orion has taken the bold and unique step of measuring its true carbon footprint – right down to the carbon within the materials used in its network.

The company is the first electricity network in New Zealand to undertake a full carbon footprint assessment of its activities, and international environmental consultant MWH believes no other network operator in the world has completed such a comprehensive evaluation.

And the result? “Pleasingly, our impact was found to be quite minimal – our annual carbon emissions are just one tenth of one percent of those produced during the generation of electricity in New Zealand each year,” says Orion chief executive Roger Sutton.

Orion’s decision to widen the scope of its footprint assessment to discover the impact its entire network, including lines, cables and transformers, has on the environment was ambitious and challenging, according to MWH which undertook the network’s carbon assessment.

The assessment was not limited to the scope typically set by most organisations – namely electricity use, fuel use and waste from office-based activities. Instead, MWH also measured emissions that occur during work on the electricity network, and ‘embodied carbon’ in the materials used. This is the carbon emitted when producing network assets such as lines, cables and transformers.

MWH found that Orion’s annual carbon footprint was 9,800 tCO2e – excluding electricity losses over its network, which result from lines and cables heating up as electricity passes through them. These losses are a natural phenomenon that are generally outside the control of electricity networks.

“Orion’s approach to carbon assessment was innovative and not the norm. This study is an important contribution to the electricity industry’s understanding of carbon assessment,” says MWH environmental scientist Veronica Ulfves.

Mr Sutton says that while Orion is only a very small contributor to carbon emissions in the electricity industry, the company intends to use the carbon assessment findings to further reduce its environmental impact.

“We’ve already begun to action some of MWH’s recommendations around how we can make environmental improvements. Orion already leads the New Zealand electricity industry in environmental performance, however we’re seeking to make an even smaller impact,” Mr Sutton says.

Key environmental improvements recommended by MWH, which will be implemented by Orion, include considering carbon costs when making network investment decisions; changing to more environmentally friendly fuel and vehicle types where possible; and increasing network peak load management to reduce the need for installing new
resource-intensive network assets.

In its carbon assessment report, MWH noted that Orion was very proactive in peak load management compared to other network companies. Orion’s focus on controlling peak electricity usage helped the environment, as reducing the need for new network infrastructure can save significant amounts of carbon. For instance, the laying of 1km of 11kV cable was found by MWH to contribute close to 30 tCO2e, given the carbon embedded in the cable and the fuel used in trenching activities. This is equivalent to the use of about 13,000 litres of petrol, or the carbon contributed by a person flying return to London seven times.

“If all other New Zealand network companies followed Orion’s lead, particularly in peak load management, it could result in carbon savings equivalent of up to 1% of New Zealand’s total annual emissions,” says Ms Ulfves.

A full copy of MWH’s carbon assessment report on Orion is available on Orion’s website at http://www.oriongroup.co.nz/your-network/community/environmental-issues/carbon-footprint-assessment.aspx

ENDS

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