Herefordshire Council most sustainable in all of the West Midlands

Herefordshire Council say they're 'pleased' it's been ranked the top performing local authority for sustainability in the West Midlands for the third year in a row.

It's after they completed the Sustainability West Midlands (SWM) benchmarking.

The results - announced last week - gave Herefordshire an overall score of 91%, which the council say demonstrates it's excellent progress to becoming net zero by 2030.

The benchmarking by members of SWM is undertaken on an annual basis via answers to 80 questions on various aspects of the Roadmap themes. It aims to help local authorities to self-assess their progress on sustainability and to more quickly identify where they should take further action.

Benchmarking can also help supporting organisations, such as national Government (BEIS, Defra etc.), the Local Government Association (LGA), the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA) and Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) to better understand where their support would be most welcomed.

Richard Vaughan, Sustainability and Climate Change Team Manager said

“We believed we were making good progress with our environmental performance, but it is nice to have that confirmed through this process and to be ranked as top performing for the third year in a row is a great expression of the hard work towards net zero that is being undertaken across the authority.”

“There is so much more that needs to be done to reach our net zero target. Some of the projects we are currently working on include expanding the Electric Vehicle charging infrastructure across the County, offering grant schemes to help retrofit some of the County’s least energy efficient homes, awarding local businesses grants to support them to reduce carbon and supporting the Herefordshire Climate and Nature Board who’s focus is on a net zero and nature rich county by 2030.”

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