Bunnings and Sustainability

We Live Here Too

We take our commitment to sustainability very seriously. We consider that our operations are sustainable when they are socially responsible, environmentally sound and economically viable.

Our team is always looking for new ways to improve the sustainability of our operations and to “do the right thing”.

Helping to Make Sustainability Easier and More Affordable

Bunnings reinforced its leadership stance and commitment to sustainability by announcing in May 2007 an $8 million investment in new environmental projects and commitments. This included:

plans to fit every Bunnings Warehouse store in sub-tropical mainland Australia with rainwater harvesting systems - $6 million over two years;
a goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2015 or earlier with new programs to accelerate the drive to achieve the goal - $2 million over two years; and
inviting submissions and offering grants to develop Bunnings carbon offsetting projects.

An update on these actions and other ongoing initiatives is provided below.

Water Saving
	Our approach to water and energy conservation is to lead by example in what we sell, what we do, and the information we provide to customers. We’ve now installed rainwater harvesting equipment at 33 stores. A further 35 installations are scheduled to occur in April, May and June which is on track with our original plan. Other initiatives include the installation of 199 waterless urinals in Australian offices, stores and operational sites, as well as basin tap flow restrictors and half flush cistern adaptors where possible.
We estimate that the water saving measures in place reduce our overall consumption by approximately ten percent or 77 megalitres per year.

Lowering Greenhouse Gas Emissions
	We’re actively reducing our energy emissions in stores through the following initiatives: “Bi level” energy efficient lighting, which uses globes that automatically switch to half and full power according to available ambient lighting has now been installed in more than 34 stores. 60 warehouse stores have been fitted with a night-switching device for reduced energy consumption during night fill work. E-tronic energy efficient lighting will be installed in over 20 stores by the end of June 2008, which should result in an emissions saving of more than 25 per cent per store per year.
	In December 2007 we commenced a carbon offset project with Landcare CarbonSMART. This project will allow us to offset over 20,000 tonnes of our 2007/08 carbon emissions through the planting of native vegetation on freehold land. Our research partnership with Western Australia’s Murdoch University is well underway. This includes a detailed assessment of our energy use and their recommendations will shape the future direction for how we build our stores and the potential use of hybrid renewable energy resources. Other initiatives include a commitment from January 2008 to purchase five per cent of our grid energy in Australia from renewable sources, and the replacement of 25 per cent of our company car fleet with Toyota Prius hybrid cars by June 2008. We continue to work on our recycling initiatives to reduce the amount of waste going to landfill, which has seen a significant increase in our recycling levels. As always, we continue to focus on providing the latest information on products and projects to help customers save on their energy use and support sustainable living.

Plastic Bag Reduction
	We continue our industry leading initiative to reduce plastic shopping bag use. Since the inception of our 10 cent plastic bag levy in September 2003, over $180,000 has been donated to the Keep Australia Beautiful Council (as of December 2007). During this period, around 200 million bags have potentially been removed from the waste and litter stream with over 1.5 million reusable bags being sold. As of April 2008 Bunnings removed single use plastic bags from all stores. Bunnings has a range of woven bags available and cardboard boxes are also provided for customer use where required.

Timber and Wood Policy
	In 2003 we established a Timber and Wood Products Purchasing policy that over time will require all wood and wood products to originate from legal and well managed forest operations. We are working with our suppliers so that they can independently verify the original forest source, and we are also seeing more paintable alternatives like MDF and jointed pine coming into our stores. From a recently conducted review we classified a little over 90 per cent of purchases of whole wood products as being low to very low risk in that the overwhelming majority (86 per cent) is derived from Australian and New Zealand native and plantation operations and the balance is made up of other softwood imports. Timber and Wood Policy Statement

Reports

The Wesfarmers Social Responsibility Report provides a detailed insight into the heart of our day to day business practices covering our health, safety and environmental performance as well as our terrific community involvement activities. What we do in these areas is a very tangible part of “who we are”. This reporting is voluntary and publicly demonstrates our commitment to continually improving our performance in these areas. By reporting in this way, we make ourselves accountable to achieve improvements.

Wesfarmers Social Responsibility Report 2007

The 2007 Community Report Card and the recent Sustainability Update provide additional information on Bunnings ongoing sustainability commitments.

Community Report Card 2007

Sustainability Update April 2008

About Us

Bunnings and Sustainability