Last month, we wrapped up the 2022 Carbon Cleanse Challenge for this year and it was a huge success! The Impact Network loves this challenge as it brings together member organizations in a fun, educational and collaborative way. Carbon Cleanse is a friendly annual competition that challenges our member organizations and their employees to reduce environmental impact and test their knowledge about sustainability. The competition is known for keeping sustainability top-of-mind at participating businesses.
Organizations had the chance to earn points over the course of one month, and as more challenges were completed, more points were awarded! From March 28th to April 22nd, participants were challenged on weekly sustainability themes of energy, water, waste and transportation and a month-long culture of sustainability theme.
Energy week raised awareness around energy conservation and provided tips on being energy efficient at the workplace. Challenges included an uncooked meal day, lights out time, an ugly sweater day turning the thermostat down, screen-free time and carbon footprint calculations.
Water week focused on using water efficiently, protecting local water sources and environmental awareness on a variety of water-related issues. Participants gained points for making meatless meals, calculating their water footprint, identifying water efficiency infrastructure at work and attending the Rain Smart Neighbourhoods event hosted by REEP and a Blue Roof Information event hosted by EnviroStewards!
Waste week focused on conscious consumerism, repurposing and repairing items to reduce waste production and increase diversion from the landfill. Organizations tested out a waste whiz app, made litterless lunches, made swaps for zero waste items and upcycled other items, collected their work waste in a jar, recycled properly and had the opportunity to pilot a green bin program!
During transportation week, employees were inspired to replace normal trips with active transportation and focus on EV awareness. Activities included scoring work commutes, taking active transportation to work, shopping local, saying no to idling and learning about electric vehicles.
Continue reading to find out what this year’s winners did to achieve Bronze, Silver and Gold status!
EY: First Place – 28,890 Points
- During Energy Week, EY employees turned their lights off for a total of 389 hours with multiple employees turning their lights off for 45 hours each! EY recorded 53.5 hours of reduced screen time. 6 employees turned their thermostat below 20°C before work and 8 employees did so during work hours!
- During Transportation Week: Employees walked 377,594 steps as part of the walk/roll to work challenge. 3 employees walked more than 10,000 steps per day and a total of 14 employees tracked their steps for the whole week! Some even completed the shop local challenge. Congratulations EY on First Place!
AET: Second Place Highlights – 25,020 Points
- During Energy Week, 1 employee enjoyed uncooked meals for 3 days and AET employees organized a virtual uncooked potluck! AET recorded a total of 19 hours screen-free time, many participated in ugly sweater day and the lights out challenge.
- AET participated in the month-long Culture of Sustainability challenge and completed bonus activities. AET organized a virtual watchalong of the Idiot’s Guide to Climate Change during virtual luncheons and had 14 employees attend. 9 employees watched/listened to sustainable documentaries and/or podcasts, and one employee read a book! AET organized a bike event to tune and check bikes for safety. They also created a sustainability information sheet to share among employees and wrote a Sustainability Vision for the company. You went above and beyond AET!
“AET is committed to giving back to the people and places in which we work. Through environmental stewardship, we continually provide resources throughout our company to support local organizations and charitable events. We are committed to conducting our business in a manner that has a positive impact on the communities in which we live and work. Our sustainability commitments focus on our ecological, financial and social responsibilities that support an improved quality of life.”
MTE: Third Place – 17,455 Points
- During Water Week 29 MTE employees completed the water word scramble and 21 completed the water bingo! They totaled 25 meatless meals, 30 water footprints calculated and 18 water efficient features at their work and home offices!
- During Waste Week 15 employees completed the waste whiz challenge, 8 litterless lunches were enjoyed, 23 zero waste swaps were made, employees put together 15 amazing upcycled creations and shared 6 organized recycling stations. Great work MTE!
Special mention to MEDA, who had offices in other countries participating and this was their very first Carbon Cleanse! MEDA was also the runner up coming in fourth place this year.
Congratulations again to this year’s winners! Winners receive bragging rights and EasyGo passes for their employee’s courtesy of TravelWise! We are already looking forward to next year’s Carbon Cleanse and can’t wait to see what the competition has in store.
Thank you to the following Impact Group organizations who participated, you made this year a huge success!
