Avove employees each save a tonne of Co2 by planting a pen!

Moving life forward!

The new utilities infrastructure company, Avove was recently launched following the sale of Amey’s Utilities arm to the equity firm Rubicon Partners. To mark the occasion and welcome all our employees to Avove, everyone received a welcome hamper containing several gifts purposely selected for their special ethical story behind them. One of which is a pen with green credentials.

The pens we have gifted to our employees can be planted. They are made with corn starch which is certified biodegradable and have meadow flower seeds in the top of them, so when planted they are capable of removing over 1000KgCo2 from the atmosphere.

If you compare the carbon footprint of a BIC Cristal ballpoint pen (apparently 14m are sold each day across the world) the emissions to create and distribute one of them would conservatively be estimated at over 70KgCo2 – this is the same as our Utilities BU fleet travelling for 730 years! or one of our small vans driving 412 km to have the same Carbon footprint as 1 BIC pen. One of these environmental pens can offset 23,000 BIC Cristal pens, so let’s get planting.