We spoke to Adam Turner, Government and Defra Sustainable Technology Lead who leads the work of the Sustainable Technology Advice & Reporting (STAR) team. STAR leads on sustainable technology policy and guidance for UK Government and have considerable amount of information already available. DEFRA also published the Greening government: ICT and digital services strategy 2020-2025 which sets out policies and best practice in detail.

Prominent DEFRA Digital blog posts on the topic of ICT sustainability:

• Defra leads on government-wide ICT sustainability report
• A decade of progress for the Government Sustainable ICT Project
• Climate change: are ICT and digital services part of the solution or the problem?

DEFRA have also enlisted their suppliers into their Defra e-Sustainability Alliance (DeSA).

The following sections highlight the areas that STAR have produced guidance or resources:

Supplier assurance / Supplier management

• Model Services Contract - Model services contract - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
• demonstrate low carbon resource efficiency, including minimising the use of resources and responding promptly to the Authority’s reasonable questions;
• The Supplier shall complete the Sustainability Report in relation its provision of the Services under this Agreement and provide the Sustainability Report to the Authority on the date and frequency outlined in Table C of this Annex.
• reduce and minimise carbon emissions by taking into account factors including, but not limited to, the locations from which materials are sourced, the transport of materials, the locations from which the work force are recruited and emissions from offices and on-site equipment
• Supplier Code of Conduct Supplier Code of Conduct - v2 (publishing.service.gov.uk)
• “I expect all suppliers and central government departments, agencies and public bodies to meet these commitments and ensure that their employees, partners and subcontractors will do the same” Gov Chief Commercial Officer
• Sustainable Procurement We expect our suppliers to be aware of, and support government in, complying with its legal and contractual obligations under social value legislation, in delivery of the wider policy that sits behind the contract, and in the delivery of the targets as defined within the Greening Government Commitments supplemented by our 25 Year Environment Plan. We expect our suppliers to assist government in the understanding and reduction of supply chain impacts on our environment, and risks related to the security of raw material supply. We expect suppliers to be open and transparent in assisting government in reporting publicly on product or service utilisation and any environmental impacts
• Also effect: Human Rights, CSR, Supply Chain, Transparency

Example Pre-Qualification Questions

These examples offer more rigour than ISO14001.

• Question 1: Please provide details of the Potential Provider's approach to managing the environmental protection/sustainability aspects of your service/technology/product.
• Question 2: Has the Potential Provider been convicted of breaching environmental legislation, or had any notice served upon it, in the last three years by any environmental regulator or authority (including local authority)?