Sustainability at Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action (DEECA)

As you can imagine this is pretty important to the Department of Environment. most offices have waste disposal systems that allow for recycling and composting, as well as waste champions that can help keep these systems running. we are pursuing 100% renewable electricity goals and are building the renewable electricity fleet

Shocking! Absolutely shocking for the Department of the Environment! Bad recycling practices in lobbies and offices. Disposable coffee cups and plastics everywhere! A lot of food and dairy waste in our office kitchenettes. And fuel-inefficient massive trucks used in the car pool, even where site visits rarely required to drive difficult tracks.

I think as a department that is all about the environment and protecting it, we could do better. I know a lot of staff are busy, but I think we should take the time to have a Quartey volunteer day with your branch or team where you go and plan trees or collect rubbish. We should lead by example and not just be behind our desks 24/7

I think that generally the government struggles to effectively act on sustainability, but having said that I think DEECA does some good work to promote sustainability.

Certainly a focus in media and initiatives - but could use work in the area of energy saving

Being the department of environment there is a strong push to model this. Everybody has keep cups and brings cutlery from home. We have clear expectations for when we use electric or hybrid vehicles.

Because the department is so big and part of the public sector more broadly, I don't have a great deal of visibility to this. What I will say is that the employees are conscious of environmental footprint, both personal and corporate.

E.g. carbon neutral conferences

This is literally the point of the Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action, so a there is an extremely high level of importance in a broad sense. On an office/individual level it varies a lot. New offices do place a high degree of importance on environmental sustainability within the building design.