Environmental Sustainability

The Postal Museum recognises the urgent need to take action to address the climate emergency.

We aim to make meaningful changes to our operation and be making tracked progress towards Net Zero emissions by 2040.

We want to embed environmental responsibility within all aspects of our work and ensure everyone understands their role in supporting delivery.

Our Goals

Minimise the environmental impact of our activities.
Communicate effectively about our environmental responsibility.

Where we are

The Postal Museum is a Carbon Measured organisation and is using 2019 as a baseline. Here you can see the breakdown of our scope 1-3 emissions.
The Postal Museum’s total Carbon Footprint for 2019 is equivalent to 177 homes’ electricity use for one year.

We’re a Carbon Measured organization with a 2019 Carbon Baseline Report.
Our Scope 1-3 emissions for the 2019 reporting year are 908.5 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (tCO2 e). That’s about 177 homes’ electricity use for one year.
We have a cross-departmental Sustainability Working Group spearheading our activity.

Where we want to be

We want to achieve Net Zero emissions by 2040.
We want to reduce our dependency on natural resources and our overall impact, from increasing biodiversity on our sites to reducing waste.
We want our staff and volunteers to be confident communicating about our environmental responsibility and clear about their roles in achieving our goals.
We want robust data collection and analysis, from greener procurement to better use of existing systems.
We want our vision funded and resourced so we can meet our goals.

How we get there

To help us reach our goals we have developed a framework which categorises our work into four areas of impact:

Place
People
Programme
Process

Our Framework has been developed with carbon reduction insights from Eight Versa, ideas generated by the museums’ cross-departmental working group and supported by actions within our Arts Council England National Portfolio Organization plan.

Place

We will make meaningful changes to our operation and achieve Net Zero emissions by 2040.

This means investing in changes to our buildings over time which results in an overall decline in emissions. Alongside this we need to work in new ways with our suppliers, both existing and new, to understand their impacts and work to reduce these. We recognise that environmental sustainability is not just about carbon reduction. We will invest time and resource to reduce all overall dependency on natural resources and the impact we have on our environment, from increasing biodiversity to reducing waste.
People

If we want to influence change, we need to be clear on what environmental responsibility means for us.

This starts with our staff and volunteers. We will support people to be confident championing good communication about environmental responsibility across all activities through training, connecting with established support networks and embedding expectations in annual planning and objectives. Alongside this, we aim to provide staff and volunteers with good choices from support to travel sustainably to the benefits we offer as part of employment.
Programme

Our vision is to put communication at the heart of everything we do.

We will talk about the urgent need for change and how we are progressing as an organisation, through all our channels. This includes using our collection to connect with audiences on this subject through learning and community programmes, our onsite content and our online presence. We will work with partners that share our vision and with experts who can help us look at collections, buildings and stories in new ways.
Process

Achieving real impact requires robust processes and realistic resources.

We will significantly improve the quality of our data collection and analysis, from greener procurement to better use of existing systems. We will measure emissions annually with support from Eight Versa and improve our governance, with leadership from our Trustees. They will take an active and accountable role in monitoring our progress. We will seek funders and partners that can support us to realise our goals, ensuring that actions are prioritised with both time and budget internally.