Specialists in Vegetation Management
Sustainability
Asplundh is committed to being both a sustainability leader and a champion of carbon reduction in the vegetation management industry. Asplundh views sustainability in terms of financial, social and environmental sustainability and it is dedicated to ensuring that our current approach to our business, our employees and the environment will continue to offer indefinite opportunity, consistent growth and environmental protection for our people, our partners and most importantly our future generations for many years to come.
Accordingly, we have in place a sustainability policy demonstrating our commitment to sustainability as well as a draft of a sustainability roadmap detailing our objectives and project testing commitments over the next few years.
Health and Safety
Our safety systems have been developed from over 90 years in the industry. We ensure that our clients, their customers and our staff use industry-accepted systems and procedures to get the job done safely and efficiently. For us, it is not a matter of complying with safety, environmental and corporate governance legislation, it is about business ethics – providing the highest standards of service to our customers, the public and our communities, as well as safe working environments for our staff.
We recognise that systematic service development and delivery has financial and ethical advantages to our business. In response, we have developed the Safety Environment and Quality (SEQ) Manual to promote the systematic implementation of safety systems across our workplaces in Australia. It is based on an integrated approach, bringing together Safety ISO 45001, AS/NZS 4801 and Environmental ISO 14001 management under the umbrella of the Quality ISO 9001 framework.
In addition, Asplundh participates in a number of Code of Practice review boards in Australia, New Zealand and the US and ensures any changes that arise from these boards are implemented across our operations. Asplundh’s SEQ (Safety-Environment-Quality) system has been developed and implemented to comply with the requirements of ISO 9001, ISO 45001, AS/NZS 4801 and AS/NZS 14001. The system is certified and regularly audited to all of the aforementioned standards.
Environment
Asplundh has been addressing and delivering environmentally friendly vegetation solutions for over 90 years. We understand the importance of environmental sustainability as central to our continued operations and are in the fortunate position to have access to every one of the efficiencies that have been developed, including those in different utility areas and even sectors. These solutions have been extensively tested in the field and conform to the highest levels of both voluntary and regulated compliance.
Asplundh is compliant with the requirements of Environmental ISO 14001 and continually seeks to improve its environmental systems, processes and practices. Accordingly, we have a number of programs in place and trials underway to maximise our environmental efficiency and minimise our emissions over the coming years.
- Vehicular black boxes and central dashboards to monitor fuel consumed and idling time – tested and implemented in the US, current testing in Australia
- Lowering fuel emissions through the use of chemical tablets – current testing in NZ
- Development of scheduling and routing software to increase route efficiency – current testing in the US and Australia
- Introduction and use of environmentally friendly herbicides to reduce emissions – used currently
- Hybrid testing with electric motors for raising and lowering booms – current testing in Australia and NZ
- Examination of alternative fuel options such as ethanol and biodiesel – current testing in the US
- Commitment to water use reduction and energy use reduction – targets set, benchmarked and monitored monthly – current process
- Recycling program in place at Corporate Headquarters – roll out in 2011 to regional hubs
- Employee education: the use of an external environmental science team to examine current operations and identify opportunities to promote biodiversity, habitat protection and conduct environmental sensitivity training for Asplundh personnel – undertaken currently
Community
Across our businesses, our goal is to minimise negative social and community impacts while maximising the opportunities and benefits that Asplundh can bring to the wider community through its work maintaining and controlling vegetation across Australia.
Asplundh believes that regular, open and honest dialogue is the key to us continuing to build win-win relationships with our community stakeholders.
Asplundh also promotes an “Industry Best Practice” approach to Vegetation Management. This means we are strongly committed to ongoing recruitment, training, up-skilling and growing our workforce utilising local training providers and suppliers.
Asplundh endeavours to use local suppliers and contractors whenever possible to support the local economy of its area of operations.
Quality Assurance
As contractors, our operations are audited constantly, be it on existing contracts or as part of an open market tendering process. The nature of Australian contracting market means we have our results compared with other contractors on a daily basis. We believe that the quality of our operations is unrivalled.
Many of our contracts involve external audits that are conducted by independent auditors, and Asplundh consistently receives excellent results.
Asplundh adheres to the quality benchmarks set out in ISO 9001. The Asplundh Safety, Quality and Environment (SEQ) Manual governs our general processes, procedures and best practices in relation to how we conduct our operations. In addition, quality systems are customised for each contract to ensure the best service and contract delivery possible for our clients.