Environment
At CSC we aim high and conduct all our business activities in an environmentally responsible manner, continually working to reduce our overall environmental impact and at the same time meeting the ever growing client demands on our services. By being flexible, positioning ourselves as early adopters, embracing new ideas and technologies and following a constant cycle of improvement we believe that CSC can continue to deliver the business solutions for the future in a sustainable way.
Please Read our Environment Policy Statement (PDF).
How does CSC Impact the Environment?
Following a comprehensive study of CSC’s Data Centre and Office operations the most significant area of impact for CSC is defined as the consumption of energy and fuels, and in particular the provision of client services on our Data Centre sites.
Secondary impacts are derived from the use of water, office paper and computer equipment and the direct and indirect use of fuel for business travel.
So what are we doing about it?
CSC Environmental Sustainability Strategy
At CSC when we talk about emissions it’s not all just hot air.
The CSC 5-Year Environmental Sustainability Strategy was launched in 2009 and is the step change vehicle that we have chosen to take all of our excellent formal ground work and environmental achievements dating back to 2002 forward to meet the new challenges and requirements of tomorrows business environment.
Based on the comprehensive impact analysis, the work of our consultants, our achievements to date and the future demands of our clients and the business we have addressed all impact areas, defined SMART objectives and targets, assigned ownership and have successful projects running to hit these targets.
See our CSC UK 5-Year Environmental Sustainability strategy.
ISO 14001-2004
CSC gained its first 14001 certificate in 2003. Since then we have rolled out the accreditation to cover all our UK Data Centers and our 8 main administrative offices. The 14001 Management System is the key tool supporting our Sustainability Strategy. Please see our certificate of approval
Carbon Management Programme
Project successes so far have included a continual improvement in energy efficiency over all UK Data Centres for a 24 month period with not only absolute improvements but also reduced variance in our processes demonstrating excellent management controls and sustainable improvements.
CSC UK has achieved accreditation to the Carbon Saver Gold Standard, demonstrating reductions in carbon emissions over a 2 year period and providing external verification of this performance.
CSC use the recommended Green Grid PUE metric to measure Data Centre efficiency. Our PUE targets for 2012 and 2015 equate to carbon savings of 19% and 24% respectively from 2008 figures. By the end of FY 2012 CSC UK had achieved an improvement in our measured PUE of 15% over FY 2009.
CSC's activity to address our carbon footprint has been validated with excellent Carbon Disclosure Project response scores of 70% in 2010, 75% in 2011 and 82% in 2012.
Office energy usage has been reduced through awareness training of key staff and the subsequent application of this knowledge. We are currently trialing new technologies to further improve on these reductions.
Not satisfied with a single approach we are addressing the CSC carbon impact from both ends and so in addition to the many projects to reduce our energy usage and improve our efficiency we have committed to the procurement of only the greenest and most efficient electricity supplies.
50% of CSC UK grid electricity is sourced from small scale hydro generation and the remaining 50% is supplied from Ofgem approved renewable sources.
This commitment aligns with our policy to reduce the size our footprint today, where and when we can, and tread as lightly as possible, where and when we can’t.
Best Practice - Sevenoaks Data Centre
Our Sevenoaks Data Centre has been designed using the latest energy saving technologies which have been implemented as follows:
- Computer rooms divided into Low density 1,000w/sqm and High density 10,000w/sqm areas
- Room layout - all data equipment racks are laid out forming hot and cold aisle improving air flow and cooling management
- Lighting - the data hall lighting is normally switched off and dark when not occupied
- Cooling – temperature controlled to maintain 24°C, 3 degrees higher than traditional data centres
- Computer room cooling units will cycle to meet the heat load within the room
- Chilled water pumps – all chilled water pumps will vary speed in order to meet the varying cooling demands of the in-room air handling units
- Water refrigeration plant – as a direct result of the high chilled water temperature “free cooling” can be used to reduce water temperatures. This uses ambient air whenever below 9°C to cool the water, ensuring the refrigeration compressors only operate for 70% of the year.
- Data racks – to cater for high heat loads produced by blade technology, APC cubes have been deployed where hot air is contained and not allowed to mix with cooled air therefore maximizing the cooling ability of the air.
Waste Management
The CSC 5 Year Sustainability Strategy has set targets for our waste management activities.
We exceeded our first target of achieving a 50% recycling rate for all wastes by 2010 with a FY2010 figure of 55.77%.
In FY2011, total waste generated fell by a further 32% and we achieved a recycling rate of 60.45%.
We are able to demonstrate continual and sustainable improvement in waste management. Our figures for the last 4 years are shown below:
Reporting Period Recycled tonnes Land filled tonnes %Recycled
Apr 11 - Mar 12 683.56* 209.16 76.57%
Apr 10 - Mar 11 520.77 340.74 60.45%
Apr 09 – Mar 10 706.55 560.24 55.77%
Apr 08 – Mar 09 534.50 650.81 45.09%
Apr 07 – Mar 08 501.99 742.19 40.35%
* From FY12 recyled data includes waste to energy.
Learn about other areas of our corporate responsibility: