Sustainability

Which? is committed to championing sustainability on behalf of UK consumers and to being a credible source of expertise and advice on sustainable choices and behaviours

Most directly, we help consumers to reduce their environmental impact by helping them choose more sustainable ways to travel, use energy, make food choices, buy and use products and services and deal with old goods and plastic waste. 

Yet there is so much more that Which? does behind the scenes. We are actively influencing policymakers in government, manufacturers and retailers as well as the finance sector to make better decisions and more choices available, to help us all move towards a more sustainable future. Simultaneously, we are reducing our own business carbon footprint, while helping our employees to live more sustainably too.

Progress in our focus areas in the past financial year

1. Enabling consumers to make more environmentally sustainable decisions

Sustainability continues to be embedded into our research and editorial teams in order to provide consumers with advice on how to make greener decisions across the breadth of Which?'s content, while our dedicated sustainability research team continues to investigate issues relevant to consumers.

In this past financial year, we’ve had a particular focus on building up our content on home energy efficiency, giving consumers advice on how to make their homes cheaper and greener to run. Our online home energy efficiency advice received over 2.1million page views (up almost 25% year on year). Our most popular online sustainability content reflects the issues most relevant to Which? users - particularly advice on solar power and battery storage, and energy saving solutions around the home.

Our free monthly sustainability newsletter continues to grow in popularity, with 420,000 recipients signed up by the end of June 2024 (compared to 339,000 by June 2023). 300,000 of those recipients are Which? members.

Other key strides in developing our sustainability content this year include: 

What’s next for consumers?

In 2024/25, we will launch a personalised tool that will help people determine the best routes to a more energy efficient home for their particular circumstances. This cross-organisational project will support consumers in better understanding the often complex decision making process around how and when to invest in low carbon home heating and other energy saving home improvement updates. As well as using the tool to access a tailored dashboard of cost information, users will be able to access our wealth of energy-related online advice and find local traders able to carry out the suggested work. 

We will also provide more detailed online guides to installing low carbon technology, including a new case-study led approach to our content on heat pumps, solar panels and insulation. The product testing team is scoping out the potential to include solar panel product test results within our Which? member exclusive content offering, with the aim to roll this out by the end of our financial year.

Our Eco Buys project continues to expand to introduce more product areas and more models. This year will also see new research to update our Eco Provider recommendations at a brand level for the energy market and other service industries. 

Other research-led investigations into the ways people can better understand and manage the environmental impact of their consumer habits include projects exploring water pollution, internal air pollution, the energy demand of online activity and the hard-to-navigate world of greenwashing, particularly in online retail and marketing.

2. Influencing businesses, government and policymakers

Our research tells us that many consumers want to play their part in tackling climate change, but this can involve complex and costly decisions. This past year we have focused on how we heat our homes, as 90% of UK homes will need to change to new low carbon systems to meet government Net Zero targets. 

  • Our new Priority Places for Insulation Index mapped the local areas where there is the greatest need for insulation based on the housing stock and the socio economic and health indicators of the local population. The findings were discussed with government, parliamentarians and industry groups.
  • Our research into consumers' experience of looking for information about insulation suggested that many consumers are not yet considering insulation and there are gaps in the information and advice that is available. In response, we have been calling on the government to step up their awareness campaigns and make improvements to their information and advice services.
  • Energy performance certificates are also an important tool that consumers can use to understand the changes that are needed. Our new recommendations set out how EPCs could be made more reliable, relevant and accessible for consumers.
  • We have also been calling on the government to improve consumer protections in this market. Currently consumers that have work funded by the government have to use installers that belong to two certification schemes. We feel that consumers who are paying for improvements themselves should have the same protections and are asking the government to set a date for when all installers must belong to these schemes.

What’s next for our influencing?

This year the UK and Scottish governments are expected to take forward the reform of Energy Performance Certificates with new consultations and findings published. We will take advantage of these opportunities to remind them of the results of our consumer research and call for reforms that will make EPCs a more effective tool for consumers looking to buy or rent a new home or make changes to their current home.

We will also be working with the UK government and businesses to support the introduction of new financial products and energy services that aim to address some of the high upfront costs of the transition to net zero. These costs can include making improvements to insulation, or installing a heat pump or solar panels. We will be undertaking research to understand consumers’ needs and reviewing proposed products and services to ensure they have strong consumer protections built in from the start.

We will also be undertaking research to understand the emerging market for Time of Use energy tariffs. These tariffs help to reduce demand on the energy network as the UK increases the use of renewable energy and have the potential to reduce consumers energy bills. We will be working with energy providers to ensure consumers have the information they need to understand and compare these tariffs and protections are in place to ensure consumers are not exposed to unreasonable risks. 

3. Reducing our own carbon footprint

Our combined scope 1 and scope 2 CO2e emissions have fallen compared to last year primarily due to reductions in our energy usage related to more efficient use of our London office space.

Annual Carbon Footprint, Scopes 1 and 2

This year we have introduced a new carbon measurement platform to help us better track our emissions. This is the first time we have fully measured our scope 3 emissions (relating to third parties). This involved collecting data from our suppliers as well as surveying staff to understand the impact of home working and commuting on our carbon footprint. The most significant areas relate to our magazine production process and our digital footprint.

Using our 2022/23 financial year, we have used the platform this year to calculate a baseline for our scope 3 emissions (9ktCO2e) - which represented over 98% of our total emissions for that year.

For 2023/2024 we set ourselves an organisation target of a 5% reduction in total emissions compared to our 2022/2023 baseline. Based primarily upon a reduction in our magazine volumes, plus more efficient use of cloud based data storage we saw our total emissions drop by 7% year on year.

Annual Carbon Footprint, Scope 3

Our carbon reduction target for 2024/2025 is a further 5% year on year reduction. In particular we are investigating what further actions we can take to reduce our scope 3 emissions from our magazine production processes and digital services.

4.Supporting our staff to live more sustainably

This year, we’ve made further strides in helping our teams adopt sustainable practices. Across our London and Cardiff offices, we’ve increased recycling streams, provided guidance for hosting sustainable events and reduced emissions by optimising office space usage.

Looking ahead, we’re exploring upgrades to the solar panels at our London office to enhance energy efficiency. Our Sustainability Champions network has driven engagement through initiatives like clothes swaps and food and herb-growing workshops, inspiring greener lifestyles.

We’ve also introduced a mini garden, where seasonal produce and plants are grown. This space not only offers staff a relaxing green area but also provides hands-on opportunities to learn about sustainable gardening. Through initiatives like this, we’re empowering our teams to live and work more sustainably.

Summary

With our history in product quality, reliability and repairability, Which? has long been involved in how consumers can make more sustainable choices. Reflecting a growing demand from consumers, we are now taking further steps to be a trusted home for everyday sustainable advice. We are committed to influencing businesses and policy-makers in areas where bigger change is needed, and we will continue to reduce our own carbon footprint as an organisation and help our people to reduce theirs. We are pleased with the progress made in 2023/24, but there is still much more to do.

Thank you for your continued support.

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