Category: Whitepaper

In today’s business landscape, environmental, social, and governance (ESG) criteria have become pivotal for commercial real estate developers. Meeting ESG targets is not only essential for sustainability but also for attracting investors, tenants, and stakeholders who prioritise responsible business practices. Advanced Bacterial Sciences (ABS) offers innovative microbial solutions that help commercial real estate developers achieve their ESG goals efficiently. This guide provides insights into how ABS products can be implemented to meet these targets, along with tips on implementation and measurable outcomes.

The Importance of ESG in Commercial Real Estate

ESG criteria encompass a broad range of considerations:

• Environmental: Focuses on reducing carbon footprints, conserving water, and minimising waste.
• Social: Emphasises the well-being of occupants and communities, promoting health, safety, and inclusivity.
• Governance: Involves transparent, ethical business practices and compliance with regulations.

By integrating ESG principles, commercial real estate developers can enhance property value, improve risk management, and foster long-term sustainability.

ABS Products for Achieving ESG Goals

ABS provides a suite of microbial treatments designed to address environmental challenges in commercial properties. Key products include URIZAP, FOGZAP, SLUDGEZAP, and Surface Descaler, each contributing to ESG targets in unique ways.

Environmental Benefits

1. URIZAP: Targets uric acid build-up in urinals, preventing blockages and reducing water usage. By maintaining efficient and odour-free washrooms, URIZAP helps conserve water and reduce chemical usage.
2. FOGZAP: Designed for grease traps, FOGZAP digests fats, oils, and grease (FOG), preventing blockages and minimising the need for water-intensive cleaning methods. This product is ideal for commercial kitchens and restaurants, significantly reducing water and chemical consumption.
3. SLUDGEZAP: Harnesses beneficial bacteria to break down organic waste in pipework and soil stacks, ensuring free-flowing systems and reducing the frequency of manual maintenance. This leads to lower energy consumption and reduced operational disruptions.
4. Surface Descaler: An eco-friendly solution that eliminates limescale and odours in hard-to-reach areas, reducing the need for harsh chemicals and promoting a healthier indoor environment.

Social Benefits

1. Enhanced Indoor Air Quality: ABS products help maintain clean and odour-free environments, contributing to healthier indoor air quality and occupant well-being.
2. Safety and Health: By reducing the reliance on hazardous chemicals, ABS solutions promote safer and healthier conditions for maintenance staff and building occupants.

Governance Benefits

1. Compliance and Transparency: Implementing ABS products supports compliance with environmental regulations and standards, ensuring transparent and ethical business practices.
2. Sustainability Reporting: ABS solutions provide measurable outcomes that can be included in sustainability reports, showcasing commitment to ESG goals.

Tips for Implementing ABS Products

1. Assessment and Planning: Conduct a thorough assessment of your property’s waste management and water usage systems. Identify areas where ABS products can have the most significant impact.
2. Pilot Program: Start with a pilot program to test the effectiveness of ABS products in specific areas, such as washrooms or kitchens. Monitor the results and gather data on improvements in water usage, energy savings, and maintenance frequency.
3. Full-Scale Implementation: Based on the pilot program results, plan a full-scale implementation across the property. Ensure that maintenance staff are trained on the proper use of ABS products.
4. Regular Monitoring: Continuously monitor the performance of ABS solutions. Use data analytics to measure outcomes and identify areas for further optimisation.
5. Stakeholder Engagement: Communicate the benefits of ABS products to stakeholders, including tenants, investors, and regulatory bodies. Highlight the positive environmental, social, and governance impacts.

Measurable Outcomes

1. Water Conservation: Track the reduction in water usage after implementing URIZAP and FOGZAP. For example, the Trafford Centre saved over 26,693,910 litres of water over three years by using URIZAP​​.
2. Energy Savings: Measure the decrease in energy consumption due to fewer blockages and maintenance interventions. Birmingham International Airport saved significant energy by eliminating urinal blockages with URIZAP​​.
3. Reduction in Chemical Usage: Monitor the reduction in the use of harsh chemicals by substituting them with ABS’s eco-friendly microbial treatments. This contributes to a safer and healthier environment.
4. Improved Indoor Air Quality: Assess the improvement in indoor air quality and occupant satisfaction by reducing odours and maintaining clean facilities.
5. Cost Savings: Calculate the cost savings from reduced water and energy bills, as well as lower maintenance costs. These savings can be reinvested in other sustainability initiatives.

Achieving ESG goals is a comprehensive endeavour that requires innovative solutions and committed efforts. ABS products offer commercial real estate developers effective tools to meet their environmental, social, and governance targets. 

By implementing solutions like URIZAP, FOGZAP, and SLUDGEZAP, developers can achieve measurable outcomes in water conservation, energy savings, chemical reduction, and improved indoor air quality. These benefits not only enhance property value but also promote long-term sustainability and stakeholder satisfaction.

Single-use plastics are slowly killing our planet.

Currently, 38.5 million plastic bottles are used in the UK every day, less than half of which is recycled.

Plastics take hundreds of years to break down so the plastics we throw away today will outlast our grandchildren. Worse still, they cause further damage by killing marine life, polluting waterways, blocking sewers, and contributing to the production of greenhouse gas emissions.

In the UK, it is estimated that each person produces 75kg of plastic waste each year, and that doesn’t include the amount generated by businesses.

While we can take measures individually to reduce plastic consumption, it is a lot harder to implement these in the workplace.

Here are some of the ways you can help reduce plastic use in your organisation:

Ban single-use water bottles and coffee cups
Invest in filtered water taps and coffee machines and provide employees with branded stainless steel water bottles and coffee cups. This helps employees save money on bottled water and takeaway coffee.

Go digital!
Turn your brochures, case studies and business cards into QR codes. Not only does this reduce paper and printing costs, but it also eradicates the need for plastic packaging.

Educate your colleagues
Some people aren’t aware of the alternatives to single-use plastic. Create a cheat sheet that can be circulated via email or host an information session to explain the changes everyone can make and the alternatives that are available in the office.

Challenge your suppliers
Many businesses are always on the lookout for ways they can execute more environmentally friendly operations. Have you tried asking your suppliers why they use so much plastic in their packaging? Or if they’d consider reducing that amount or removing it altogether? They might start using less plastic in their operations, if not, you can always switch to a more sustainable supplier.

Responsibly source your office supplies
Many manufacturers have removed single-use plastic from the packaging of common products such as tea, coffee, and milk. This is just one small step you can take to reduce the amount of single-use plastic that ends up in landfill.

Invest in eco-friendly cleaning products
Many eco-friendly products come in concentrated forms, or ‘forever bottles’ with refillable solutions that don’t contain toxic and harmful chemicals.
Better yet, some of these products are so effective that you can make further reductions to single-use plastics in washrooms. URIZAP is a unique formulation that removes blockages from urinals, and the cause of foul odours, allowing you to ditch urinal mats and pods for good!

Contact us now to learn more about our next-generation bacterial treatments.

If you’re surfaces smell like bleach, you are harming yourself, and worse still, harming the planet.

We associate ‘cleanliness’ with the powerful smell of bleach and other harsh, toxic ingredients because that’s what we’re used to.

These products are effective at clearing away grease, grime, and other mess. However, burning and killing as a cleaning strategy is not only antiquated, it remains dangerous for human use, and over time damages surfaces.

Here are five reasons why your organisation should make the switch from harsh chemicals to eco-friendly alternatives:

Reduce pollution!
Cleaning products are a major contributor to air pollution, with some studies suggesting that they increase air pollution indoors. Furthermore, these harsh chemicals are often washed down drains, polluting waterways, killing marine life, and creating more work for water treatment plants.

ABS has created a range of products that work to naturally break down waste. These solutions are non-hazardous to humans and marine life, and work to regenerate natural systems.

Save money
Many eco-friendly cleaning alternatives are designed to be more concentrated, so you don’t need to use as much, allowing them to last longer. Given that sustainable alternatives are competitively priced, it is now more economically viable to make the shift.

It is estimated a company with 20 employees can save £15,000 a year just by replacing paper towels and wipes with reusable cloths.

Maximise infrastructure
Throughout the United Kingdom, there are thousands of listed buildings that are protected by law to retain their structural significance and in most cases, these buildings have retained their original internal infrastructure.

Traditional cleaning products are packed with a mixture of toxic chemicals which erode pipework over time, leading to costly repairs and replacements that need to align with heritage standards.

URIZAP is a specially formulated bacterial alternative to harsh chemicals that effectively removes the root cause of blockages, eliminating odours in the process and maintaining infrastructure integrity while removing the need for costly repairs or replacement.

Health benefits
Chemical-based cleaners can be corrosive and release harmful fumes and allergens that may cause respiratory irritation, broken skin, chemical burns, allergic reactions and even poisoning if ingested.

A study conducted by Harvard University and the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research discovered that using bleach-based cleaning products just once a week is enough to increase a person’s chance of developing chronic obstructive pulmonary disease by a third.

Reduce single-use plastics
Eco-friendly businesses consciously source the ingredients and packaging for products, often using materials that are recycled, reusable or biodegradable. Using certain alternatives means that you no longer must buy plastic products.

Bathroom deodorisers and urinal inserts are often entirely made up of plastic and require frequent replacement. These are usually masking agents, hiding a bigger problem such as odour-causing blockages. Using a product like URIZAP, that deals with the root cause of the issue, solves the issue for good and allows you to ditch single-use plastic for good!

Switching to sustainable cleaning alternatives is just one simple way of reducing your carbon emissions and implementing greener strategies within your business. The UK government has committed to reducing the country’s carbon emissions to net zero by 2050. This means that every business within the country has a significant part to play in reducing emissions.

Use this sustainability calculator to understand your current carbon usage and what you can do to reduce it.