There for tomorrow

Many of the projects completed over the past 12 months demonstrate how the Group’s divisional businesses are significantly improving living and working conditions, both for today’s society and for the generations that will follow us.

Radcliffe Primary Care Centre was built to provide its local community with a new £10.6m GP Practice and Health Services Centre. However, local involvement began long before the first patient arrived. From the outset, Morgan Ashurst recruited many of its staff, as well as suppliers and contractors, from the Bury and Radcliffe area. Using a local workforce reduced the project’s overall carbon footprint while providing a positive input to the local economy.

In the Midlands, Lovell is helping the Sandwell Decent Homes Partnership to provide dwellings that solve the housing needs of today and are constructed to stand the test of time. Lovell is playing an important role in a £425m scheme to improve 30,000 homes in the region. Recognised as a best practice exemplar by Constructing Excellence, the imaginative refurbishment of existing high rise flats provides a larger living area, better thermal insulation and safer stairwells. The involvement of residents at all stages of the development process was an important consideration to the success of the project.

Impressive sustainability performance is also evident in a refurbishment of a different kind delivered by Fit Out. Challenging environmental standards were set by Deloitte for their New Street Square offices in London. These included the monitoring and measurement of materials entering and leaving the site. Monthly reports on waste management, energy and water use, and carbon emissions from transport were provided to the client. Care was taken to educate the supply chain on key issues, particularly the sustainable sourcing of timber and environmental best practice. As a result, Overbury achieved an excellent 99.5% use of certified sustainable timber and the supply chain benefited directly from the training and guidance, with two achieving ISO14001 certification for their environmental management systems.