As part of 2012-15 Funding Agreements for National portfolio organisations, Bridge organisations, Major partner museums and Museum development providers lead organisations, we have asked organisations to:
1 collect environmental data and
2 have in place an Environmental Action Plan and Policy
Our partnership with Julie's Bicycle provides the means for organisations to achieve this.
What we require
Collecting environmental data
We are asking organisations each year to measure greenhouse gas emissions from energy and water use.
Organisations are asked to enter their annual energy and water consumption from their utility invoices into Julie's Bicycle's IG Tools. Data can be entered annually, quarterly or more regularly if preferred.
For each year the funding agreement covers, we are asking for the data entry to be completed by a deadline. The deadline for 2012/13 data is 31 May 2013.
Julie's Bicycle will provide us with breakdowns and analyses of IG-Tool usage, including regular engagement statistics.
Having an environmental policy and action plan in place
We are asking organisations to have developed or updated their environmental policy and action plan by 31 May 2013. We realise that for many organisations, this is when the first complete year of environmental data will be available and, consequently, their Plan/ Policy will reflect that.
Organisations will need to report on their progress via the new Annual Report. For more details, please see our guidance.
Julie's Bicycle has created guidelines to help develop environmental policies and action plans and provided examples currently being used by creative organisations to show what an environmental policy could look like in practice.
See the Environmental Policy and Action Plan guidelines
Read examples of policies and action plans
Partnership with Julie's Bicycle
Our partnership with Julie's Bicycle represents a new way of working for Arts Council England whereby Julie's Bicycle provides support and expertise directly to funded arts and cultural organisations.
Julie's Bicycle is providing:
- free-to-use online carbon calculators, called the IG Tools, which enable clients to measure the environmental impacts of their annual energy and water use. These have been developed over a number of years and have been designed to reflect the specific sectors and activity types represented by funded organisations
- telephone and email support for organisations learning how to use the IG Tools
- resources to assist organisations with the development of environmental policies and action plans
- telephone and email support for questions regarding the development of environmental policies and action plans. Julie's Bicycle will not be able to review policies and action plans
- analysis of results for Arts Council England
Between May and July 2012, Julie's Bicycle ran a series of workshops across the country to introduce the IG-Tools, resources and support that the organisation is providing.
Information from these workshops, along with a wealth of other information and resources are available on Julie's Bicycle's webpage for funded organisations.
Policies and Action Plans
Julie's Bicycle have created specific guidelines to help develop environmental policies and action plans and provided examples currently being used by creative organisations to show what an environmental policy should look like in practice. These are to be found on the webpage for funded organisations.
Workshops and webinars
Julie's Bicycle will be providing additional workshops in the Autumn of 2013 and, from March to May, Wednesday Webinars to advise and support organisations. The recordings of these sessions are available via Julie's Bicycle website.
Our support
The Arts Council has an internal team of Regional sustainability ambassadors that can be contacted with queries about internal processes as well as for further information and support. To contact your local sustainability ambassador, please email us at sustainability@artscouncil.org.uk.
A reminder of why we are doing this
- financial - An analysis of 86 organisations that had been engaged since 2010 showed they had made £800,000 in real savings. Scaled up, that could represent £15 million across the portfolio
- ethical - 'The magnitude of the task required to deal with the challenges of climate change requires societal action on a bigger scale.' (Alan Davey) Put simply, it's the right thing to do
- legal - There are already various legal environmental requirements for organisations; others are expected to be introduced over time. This action helps organisations with readiness
- stakeholder engagement - Staff, artists, partners and audiences and are increasingly expecting, and indeed welcoming, environmental commitments from their organisations
- governance - This work helps organisations to look upstream: to seize opportunities; to identify and mitigate risks, and to deploy resources effectively
