Ellers Farm is a state-of-the-art distillery in the heart of North Yorkshire. On track to becoming a B-Corp and committed to minimising their negative impacts, the business is built on good principles that start with a vision of making the world’s best spirits in the most sustainable way.
For Ellers Farm, Carbon Literacy was the perfect step to a wider understanding of sustainability. Tabatha Hurst, Head of Sustainability was drawn to the great formulaof the Carbon Literacy Project that aims to get people to understand what climate change is, what carbon emissions are and how we can take action to actually reduce them. Carbon Literacy training has been organised for all the staff at Ellers Farm, and the distillery is now a certified Carbon Literate Organisation.
Everyone that attended the course loved the material and came away having learnt something new. As part of the course, every learner made a pledge to reduce their individual and group carbon footprint, and this activity has led to every team member thinking about how they could do things differently, and more sustainably as a business.
According to Tabatha, a challenge for every business is how to bring everybody in the team up the same level of knowledge, because you may have some staff running away with big net zero ideas whilst others switch off to the concept and disassociate individual, everyday actions with the extreme weather events and climate change stories on the news. Carbon Literacy helps foster this equitable level of knowledge, giving everyone the same understanding of the science and the actions that can be taken to prevent and mitigate the worst effects of human caused climate change.
“There are great conversations that are happening, and rather than not knowing where we are, we are talking honestly amongst ourselves and with our customers and suppliers about what we do know and where we’re going, and Carbon Literacy has helped us with that – it’s helped people to understand why we’re doing what we’re doing”
Tabatha Hurst, Head of Sustainability, Ellers Farm Distillery
Tabatha and the team at Ellers Farm know they still have a long way to go, and they are in the process of calculating the carbon footprint of everything they do and identifying areas of the distillery where they can put sustainability into practice. This could mean better insulation for pipework and starting to look at capturing the carbon from fermentation. There is even talk of building polytunnels out the back of the brewery to grow produce using excess heat from the distilling process. Planted this year and a point of pride for Tabatha is the distillery’s new orchard that has incorporated 361 trees and 29 different varieties of apples.
To find out how Carbon Literacy might help you or a brewery you work with, feel free to get in touch with us and find out more. The first portion of our Carbon Literacy Training for breweries course is available for free on our website and we hold monthly workshops that help learners get the knowledge needed to receive an internationally recognised certificate from the Carbon Literacy Project.