Environmental and climate resilience
Reducing our environmental impact while building network resilience to climate change.
As governments and communities commit to achieving net zero emissions, we are also implementing strategies to reduce carbon emissions from our operations.
Our poles, powerlines and associated infrastructure both above and below ground is exposed to the effects of climate change. Forecasts for increasingly extreme weather conditions are influencing how we manage, maintain and construct our networks. The benefit for customers is felt in highly reliable power supplies.
At the same time, we recognise our responsibility to protect our environment for future generations. We achieve this in three ways:
- Supporting more renewable energy to be connected and distributed
- Reducing the direct and indirect carbon emissions from our business
- Executing an internationally certified environmental management system that governs our activities.
Our target is to achieve a 30% reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 compared to 2019 levels. Distribution line losses from our networks are the source of most of our carbon emissions. So by enabling more residential rooftop solar as well as large-scale renewable connections, the carbon associated with the electricity we distribute falls.
In addition, we are reducing our environmental impact through better network efficiency, waste and recycling and adopting Zero Emissions Vehicles.
Meanwhile, the resilience of our networks to the impacts of climate change is a high priority given the United Energy region contains Hazardous Bushfire Risk Areas and places that can often experience extreme wind, storms and floods.
We aim to reduce both the number of customers affected and the duration of any power outages occurring due to power outages. This is reflected in targets set for our networks by the Australian Energy Regulator. Each year, we aim to outperform these targets.