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Sustainability in Enterprise - 2bm

How support from Nottingham Trent University’s Carbon Management Programme is helping data centre architects 2bm take control of their carbon footprint.

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2bm building

Nottingham-based 2bm has been at the forefront of award-winning design, build, refurbish and upgrade of server rooms and data centres, delivering creative solutions to the most complex projects for over 20 years.

Sustainability is a key part of every 2bm project, combined with a design ethos which focuses on using proven technologies to reduce energy use and carbon emissions, in both new and legacy data facilities.

2bm has a raft of environmental accreditations, including ISO 14001: 2015 and the EcoVadis gold standard – the world’s most trusted provider of business sustainability ratings.

In addition, 2bm are CEEDA (Collaborative Engineering Education in the Digital Age) certified designers and members of the Green Grid – a global, non-profit industry consortium working to improve the energy efficiency of data centres.

In terms of the wider community, 2bm are also a founding partner of ‘Meet for Good’. A local collective which brings together business, sport and charity, in order to tackle a range of issues including mental health and wellbeing.

2bm also recently completed NTU’s Carbon Management Programme through the Sustainability in Enterprise project. The programme, which is part-funded by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), is being delivered by Nottingham Business School (NBS) academics with expertise in sustainability and carbon management.

2bm - Luke Radford

Luke Radford, Administration Manager and Sustainability Lead at 2bm

We spoke to Luke Radford, 2bm’s Administration Manager and Sustainability Lead, to find out how the company have benefited from the Carbon Management Programme:

“Our first carbon footprint was calculated by an external consultant, however we felt that we wanted to undertake the next one ourselves. I joined the Carbon Management Programme with an open mind, not only to expand my knowledge and understanding of sustainability, but also to gain more insight into the data we need to successfully produce our own in-house carbon reports.

“We learnt about carbon management and how to calculate our carbon emissions and develop an action plan to reduce our carbon impact. The programme fitted in nicely with what I’d already learnt and proved really useful.

“The programme was also a great opportunity to find out what other SMEs in the area were doing to help the environment, and proved to be the perfect platform to talk with others about sustainability.”

What we’re doing now

“We’re now finalising our first ever in-house carbon report for 2022, which is due to be published very soon. Producing it ourselves instead of using an external consultant, has given us more clarity and understanding, in particular when it comes to our carbon footprint. We are no longer pulling out figures and giving them to someone else, thanks to the Carbon Management Programme, we now know what’s needed to efficiently and effectively produce a carbon report and to ensure the data we are using is correct.”

The impact

"As well as making our carbon reporting more accurate, bringing it in-house has saved us thousands of pounds in consultancy fees."

“As well as making our carbon reporting more accurate, bringing it in-house has saved us thousands of pounds in consultancy fees. At the same time it has enabled 2bm to focus on sustainability as a business and to understand exactly what we want to achieve, which is the baseline of carbon reporting.

“We’ve already switched to energy efficient LED lighting and reduced the number of water stations in our building. Now, we’re looking at ways we can reduce our paper usage by new systems and also encouraging greener ways of business travel.

“We are also exploring longer-term options such as installing solar panels to help offset our carbon footprint, and planning to set sustainability targets later on this year.

“NTU have done well to come up with a programme that’s easy to follow and learn from and it’s nice for SMEs like us to have that bond with the university and each other. We’ve had a lot of support to understand what a sustainable way forward looks like for 2bm, and I’ve learnt a lot.”

How to access the support available

Find out more about the broad range of support that NTU is providing to local businesses: