Building a Greener Society | Environmental impact | YBS
Find out how to make your home more energy efficient and what we are doing to reduce our emissions.
Make your home more energy efficient
Snugg can help customers finds ways to make their home more energy efficient by offering a free personalised home energy improvement plan.
The plan includes:
Your current energy performance rating
Explore changes you could make to improve how energy efficient your home is
How these changes can improve your energy performance rating
Check to see if you are eligible for any government grants to help fund these improvements
Find a trusted installer
You must be 18+ and a UK resident to use Snugg’s services. YBS is an introducer to Snugg and does not receive any commission for this introduction. We can’t give advice or provide any assurances about the services they provide. So think carefully when deciding if the services they recommend are right for you. By clicking on the Snugg link, you will be leaving the YBS website.
What is an EPC?
EPC stands for Energy Performance Certificate.
It is a grade from A to G that tells you how energy efficient a property is.
A is the best rating, G is the worst.
Making changes, like solar panels or insulation, could improve your EPC rating.
Energy saving trust
Tips and advice for using less energy and cutting down your monthly bills.
The green deal
A loan from the government to carry out energy saving changes to your home.
Energy efficient home
Find out more about the actions you can take now to make your home more energy efficient.
Retrofitting your home
Retrofitting means making changes to your home so it becomes more energy efficient.
This could mean installing insulation, upgrading your windows, or making changes to your heating. Find out what you can do to make your home more energy efficient.
This could mean installing insulation, upgrading your windows, or making changes to your heating. Find out what you can do to make your home more energy efficient.
Our carbon footprint
We’re working hard to reduce our impact on the environment and become more sustainable.
We’re doing this by:
We’re doing this by:
Measuring our impact.
Partnering with the Yorkshire and Humber Climate Commission to support local change.
We’re also part of the Building Societies Association Green Finance Taskforce.
Our carbon emissions for 2022 and 2023
| 2023 location based emissions (tCO2e) | 2022 location based emissions (tCO2e) | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Scope 1 | Direct emissions from our own operations and assets we directly control or own, such as gas usage. | 733 | 949 |
| Scope 2 | Indirect emissions linked to the purchase of electricity in our operations. | 1,740 | 1,582 |
| Scope 3 | Indirect emissions from sources not owned or controlled by us but are part of our value chain. This includes employee commuting and waste generation. | 4,707 3,648 tCO2e of this is from employee homeworking and commuting. We’ve included these activities in our report for the first time in 2023. | 947 This figure doesn’t include employee homeworking and commuting. |
| Total | 7,180 | 3,478 | |
Our market-based emissions for Scopes 1 and 2 are just 5 tCO2e, as the energy we use comes from renewable sources.
Scope 3 has increased as we now include homeworking and commuting.
More colleagues also returned to the office or travelled on business in 2023, compared to the years affected by COVID.
We expect our carbon footprint to increase over the next few years. This is because we’re improving how we collect data and report on it.
A full breakdown of our emissions is on pages 130 – 133 of our 2023 Annual Report and Accounts.
Our commitment to achieving Net Zero
By 2035, we want to achieve Net Zero in our Scope 1 and 2 emissions.
By 2050, we want to achieve Net Zero on our Scope 3 operational emissions and financed emissions.
Our 10 climate commitments
1
Achieve Net Zero scope 1 and scope 2 emissions by 2035 and Net Zero scope 3 operational emissions by 2050.
2
Maintain a 100% renewable operational energy supply in line with RE100 requirements. YBS will move towards non-burning green energy and install heat pump systems in all properties where this is feasible.
3
Add only hybrid or electric vehicles to our fleet from 2025, working towards a full electric fleet as soon as operationally possible.
4
Improve climate change resilience across all areas.
5
Target and maintain a minimum annual landfill diversion rate of 97%.
6
Implement further policies to prevent lending or investing in economic sectors that have a heightened climate risk and/or are environmentally damaging.
7
Launch a customer Net Zero transition plan, increase understanding of our financed emissions, and support our customers with their Net Zero transition.
8
Support customers to make better environmental choices by helping them understand climate change and how it impacts housing.
9
Launch a member-focused Net Zero transition plan, which will include green savings product initiatives.
10
Continue to align our Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures with best practice and create a platform on YBS’s website to showcase our progress and future plans on climate thinking.