The Crown Estate signs up to Circular Economy 100 platform

Property giant The Crown Estate has today (27 March) become the latest corporate member of the Circular Economy 100 (CE100), the innovation platform launched by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation to accelerate circular economy ambitions.


The Crown Estate, which owns a £12bn portfolio including central London commercial property, British retail and leisure destinations, and offshore wind in its capacity as manager of the UK seabed, will embark on a three-year project to embed circular economy principles across the business.

Through the programme, The Crown Estate will look to achieve its goal to remove all carbon and waste from the company by 2030.

“We have ambitious targets for creating our resilient business of the future,” The Crown Estate’s head of sustainability Claudine Blamey said. “To do this we are looking outside of our sector to innovate and access the knowledge of external experts. The Ellen MacArthur Foundation and the CE100 will play an important role in enhancing our knowledge and developing our plan for a sustainable future.”

Circular estate

The firm’s existing circular economy initiatives have led to a 5% fall in carbon emission intensity since 2012, and seen 98% of waste diverted from landfill on its current developments.

One of the firm’s major resource-efficient initiatives, a waste consolidation programme across its central London portfolio, aims to reduce waste from businesses in Regent Street and St James’s, consolidate collections into fewer journeys and increase the use of electric vehicles (EVs).

The Crown Estate’s 7 Air Street won last year’s E&E Sustainable Building of the Year award. The building is the first Grade 2-listed building ever to achieve the BREEAM 2011 Outstanding rating and is the highest-scoring office scheme against current BREEAM standards.

The announcement comes weeks after fellow real estate company Land Securities announced the approval of its science-based target to reduce emissions by 80% by 2050.

The Crown Estate joins the likes of Coca-Cola, Unilever and Apple in signing up to the CE100 initiative. Food processing and packaging company Tetra Pak last year announced it would use the platform to open-up collaborative opportunities with companies and organisations which are actively seeking and developing closed-loop models.

Global sportswear brand Nike joined the Ellen MacArthur Foundation as a global partner, following a network of organisations including H&M, Cisco, Kingfisher, Philips, Google, Renault and Unilever.

George Ogleby

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