Four of Canada's largest oil and gas producers are announcing today the results of a pilot campaign to get their employees to take action to reduce their personal greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Under the workplace-based One Tonne Corporate Challenge (OTCC), established by the Pembina Institute with support from the Government of Canada's Climate Change Action Fund, hundreds of employees of Shell Canada, Petro-Canada, Suncor Energy, and ConocoPhillips Canada have already committed to reduce their annual GHG emissions by a total of 4,601 tonnes. And they've been pleasantly surprised to find out just how easy it can be. The results of the OTCC pilot are published in One Tonne Corporate Challenge: Overview, Evaluation and Lessons Learned released today by the Pembina Institute.
"We started up Shell's One Tonne Challenge in October 2003 and, invited employees to commit to reduce their personal GHG emissions by one tonne. In fact they are doing better than that. The average reduction per registrant was 1.53 tonnes, equaling an average energy savings of $538 per year," said Dr. J. Ashley Nixon, Sustainable Development Advisor and One Tonne Challenge Coordinator for Shell Canada Limited. "All this is possible by taking simple actions to reduce energy use at home and in personal transportation. Just imagine what could be achieved if 10 million Canadians did the same."
High employee participation rates suggest that people are more than happy to take action to reduce GHG emissions when they have the information and tools to make it easy.
"The One Tonne Challenge is about taking personal responsibility for improving our energy use, and we are very proud of our employees' enthusiastic response to the program," said Shannon Morin, Suncor's Environmental Advisor, Sustainable Development and One Tonne Challenge Coordinator. "It's important to recognize that using energy wisely in our day-to-day activities is critical to making long-term progress in addressing global climate change."
Enthusiasm for the program was evident at ConocoPhillips as well. "We saw immediate results at ConocoPhillips, as it was a great fit with our education program on energy efficiency at work and at home. Over 400 people from our Calgary office and field locations signed up on the first day of the program. The online tool generated a lot of coffee station talk. People were surprised at how easy it was to reduce emissions and save money without changing their whole lifestyle," said Roxanne Pettipas, Environmental Advisor, Sustainable Development and One Tonne Challenge Coordinator for ConocoPhillips Canada.
The Pembina Institute's One Less Tonne tool was an integral component of the OTTC. The tool, which is also available in a public version at www.onelesstonne.ca, lists a variety of actions that individuals can take to reduce their personal greenhouse gas emissions and calculates typical emission reductions and dollar savings for each action. It also provides detailed information on taking each action for those wanting to learn more.
"Realizing that my family produced about five tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per year was pretty shocking. We live a pretty modest lifestyle and I had no idea we produced that amount of greenhouse gases. [The One Less Tonne tool] is a very motivational tool because you can see right away that even small actions make a big difference. It makes you realize that you don't have to eat the whole elephant in a single bite," said Maureen Pyne, One Tonne Challenge Coordinator for Petro-Canada.
The four companies began the OTCC pilot project in October 2003. The pilot concluded December 31, 2004. The Pembina Institute is now expanding the OTCC to other Canadian companies interested in getting their employees involved in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
"Since the pilot was so successful, we're sure that other organizations will want to use the tool as a way of motivating their own employees to meet the One Tonne Challenge. The energy cost savings make it all that much more worthwhile," says Ellen Francis, manager of the One Tonne Challenge corporate program at the Pembina Institute.
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For more information, contact
Ellen Francis, OTC Manager
Pembina Institute
403-269-3344 ext.116
Jackie Dragojevic, Manager of Media Relations
Petro-Canada
403-296-3648
Roxanne Pettipas, OTC Coordinator
ConocoPhillips Canada
403-433-4221
Ashley Nixon, OTC Coordinator
Shell Canada
403-691-4965
Shannon Morin, OTC Coordinator
Suncor Energy Inc.
403-205-6720
For more information on the Federal Government's One Tonne Challenge, contact
Kari-Lynn Phillip, Program Officer
Natural Resources Canada
613-996-2293
The report can be downloaded here