General Publications
The Carbon Neutral Public Service programme – our emissions inventory and reduction plan
What is the Carbon Neutral Public Service?
The Carbon Neutral Public Service programme aims to demonstrate government leadership on sustainability by reducing government’s environmental impact.
It will do this by making the 34 core public service agencies carbon neutral. It will make sure the six lead agencies are carbon neutral by 2012 with the other 28 agencies being on the path to carbon neutrality by 2012.
How does the programme work?
The programme involves a three-step process.
- Measuring the greenhouse gas emissions from each agency’s activities.
- Reducing those emissions.
- Offsetting remaining emissions by undertaking projects to remove an equivalent amount of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or prevent it being released.
All 34 agencies will complete an annual emissions inventory, develop an emissions reduction plan for their organisation and implement the actions in their plans. The programme will use New Zealand-based projects to offset the greenhouse gas emissions that cannot be avoided after emissions reduction activities have taken place.
Our emissions inventory and reduction plan
The Department of Labour is one of the government agencies taking part in the Carbon Neutral Public Service programme.
You can find our emissions inventory and our reduction plan for 2006/07 below:
Highlights from our emissions inventory and reduction plan are:
- The Sustainability and Energy Management contract began on 1 September 2007. This is a whole-of-department contract and one benefit will be identification of high energy users so that energy audits and improvement efforts can be focused for greatest gains.
- A vehicle fleet audit has been undertaken and a fleet management contract is in place. Fleet management arrangements are focusing progressive vehicle replacement decisions to include sustainability criteria.
- Progressive development of waste streaming and recycling opportunities.