Dimensiones de la sínfisis

The ENWORKS Online Resource Efficiency Toolkit (‘the Toolkit’) is a bespoke piece of web- based software, developed to capture and report the economic and environmental outcomes of resource efficiency activity, for example in individual businesses or via business support

projects.

It has been used by ENWORKS since 2004 and has been taken up by others across the UK, including the London Development Agency, the South East England Development Agency, the national Envirowise programme, the Welsh Assembly Government and a number of commercial enterprises.

Currently, there are over 10,000 businesses registered on the Toolkit, with over 40,000 individual resource efficiency improvements being tracked.

The Toolkit is hosted on a secure site, with multiple access/security levels enabling it to be used by the beneficiaries of support, support providers, programme managers and other

stakeholders, whilst protecting commercial confidentiality.

The Toolkit enables all relevant parties to log, manage, quantify and report in real time the cost savings and resource savings associated with improvements made in resource efficiency.

Application of the Toolkit

The Toolkit has a straightforward ‘family tree’ structure which is flexible enough to work for a diverse range of delivery mechanisms, project structures or business models, whilst ensuring data security and confidentiality.

The Toolkit logs individual improvement actions (Opportunities) that have been identified, for example through an audit or site review, as having the potential to increase resource efficiency, reduce waste to landfill or improve sustainable procurement practices.

It then tracks these improvements through to completion. As such, it can be used by any project that delivers resource efficiency improvements or carbon savings to business, or by any

individual businesses doing the same.

Data Capture and Applications of the Toolkit

Each Opportunity (improvement action) is recorded using both qualitative information (e.g. a description of the improvement) and quantitative information (e.g. the Capital Cost associated with the improvement).

Each Opportunity is assigned a Status to describe the progress that has been made by the business on that improvement action (from Initial Scope, to Investigation... to Implementation, to Achieved).

Each Opportunity is broken down into its component parts. These parts are the quantified cost and resource savings (multiple resources can be saved by one improvement action).

Savings are categorised as either Resource Reduction – using less of a particular resource; Waste Diverted from Landfill – changing the way waste is managed; or Substitution – changing the nature of a resource used.

Resource Types for each saving are logged from a list of 26 covering different energy types, water sources and Defra priority materials. The Method by which a saving is being made is also recorded from a list of 22 options.

The Toolkit has a number of different reports, the content of which can be determined by selecting criteria from up to 15 filters. These filters allow the reports to be tailored for different uses, thus enabling both simple status reporting and more complex comparative analysis to take place.

Where the reports contain information on outcomes, such as cost savings or resource savings, these are reported as both Cumulative savings to date (daily accrual of savings taking into account any capital investment required) and as Annualised or One-Off savings.

CO2e savings are also reported wherever there is a nationally approved (UK Defra) GHG

conversion factor – all factors are fully visible so there is complete transparency in any reporting.

Benefits of the Toolkit

The Toolkit can assist with removing barriers to engagement in resource efficiency and waste management improvements – these commonly include a lack of time, resources and expertise, and the difficulties of managing seemingly large amounts of complex data across multiple improvement projects.

The Toolkit helps to overcome these by providing a flexible yet robust management tool that the majority of users do not have the financial resources or the expertise to develop alone. It can be updated and report status very quickly and it captures and manipulates complicated datasets for the user.

The Toolkit helps to create a knowledge bank within organisations that is not vulnerable to staff changes, and assists with knowledge transfer and information management.

The Toolkit can also assist in resolving common difficulties associated with managing the delivery of resource efficiency projects/support – these may include the absence of commonly agreed metrics and reporting systems; the need to collate and analyse complex data in different ways for different audiences at different times; and the verification and objective assessment of outcomes.

The Toolkit provides a standardised management and recording system for outcomes that is capable of reporting in real time with a good degree of flexibility in report content and focus. It also provides the framework for ensuring that savings are verified by the beneficiary and/or can be externally evaluated.

To support the continual improvement of activity and the future development of policies, the Toolkit allows comparative analysis of projects/outcomes to take place in real time, and in a range of data combinations.

This enables best practice to be identified and shared, and the improvement programme course to be corrected if necessary. It allows a comparative analysis of activity and a clear and

transparent evaluation of ‘environmental support’ or ‘resource efficiency projects’ to take place on an ongoing basis.

The Toolkit can provide an evidence base for future policy and programme development by quantifying the impact of interventions over time. It has been used as such in research

undertaken by UK government departments including Defra, BIS and DECC, and the European Commission.

Annex D – Analysis and Quality Assurance