We hope you enjoy visiting North Devon as much as we enjoy living here. Much of what makes this place special is the history and the unspoilt beauty of its natural landscape, we are trying to look after it for ever and keep it beautiful by protecting the nature, conserving energy and water and minimising waste by recycling and composting as much as possible. We ask guests at Millbrook to help with this as much as possible.
Millbrook Cottages are committed to sustaining our natural surroundings by reducing our environmental impact and promoting good practices through:
Training employees within their working practices, ensuring reduced impact in all areas.
Educating guests in the sound understanding of environmental impact and reduction.
Complying with relevant environmental legislation and implementing systems and procedures to assure compliance.
Monitoring our environmental action plan at the quarterly Health & Safety meetings.
Being consistently aware of areas for improvement and improving eg asking people not to leave things on standby
Key areas for continuous improvement
Reduce our energy consumption by increased energy efficiency
Reduce our water consumption by improving water usage and waste
Create less waste by the use of waste reduction and recycling
Continue with our tree planting and land management plan to offset your holiday in Devon
When required always replacing electric products with AAA rated appliances
Work so Far
Recycling procedures in place and information in all cottages - recycling is a necessity not an option
2kw of PV panels
5kw wind turbine
750w water turbine
95% of light bulbs in the cottages have been changed to low energy
Instigated thermostats on the heating systems
Instigated floor and loft insulation
Replaced existing boilers with high efficient on demand LPG Combi boilers
Gained GOLD for Green Tourism Awards
Bio Mass Heating in the office with locally sourced wood
Weekly Bench marking of Electricity, Water usage and refuse
Introduction of Eco Friendly Cleaning Supplies
Purchase only FSC wood products
Nouvelle recycled toilet paper
Eco Office Supplies
Turn off policy
Dual Flush Toilets/Hippo Bags
Aerators on all taps to reduce water
Use of Native only trees in offsetting planting
Green electric Supplier
Water butts to collect rain water for hanging baskets
Hosted Shared servers for Email and CRM
Sensored led office lighting
High Levels of Draught insulation
High Levels of insulation
Call Conferencing to prevent unnecessary car journeys
All in One Networked printer solution
Double sided printing using recycled paper for printing
Recycling printer cartridges
Fax to Email service to save paper
Recycling of glass, metal and plastic
Fair trade tea and coffee products
Regular Eco Reviews with our eco supplier agenda
Involvement with local community projects
Giving unwanted hardware to local charities
Staff education
Bio Diesel/ Low emission / economical vehicles
Composting (tea bags, green waste, fruit etc
Solar powered fairy lights
Energy Saving light bulbs in outside lights
Local Purchasing
Our Future Plans
Rain water harvesting (pipes already installed in bathrooms) to supply toilets in Corncott, Pulley and Wheel Room
Air to Air heat pump for background heat in Lakeview
Improving constantly and looking for new ways to help the environment
Produce a Millbrook help sheet about being Eco Friendly
Devon Wildlife Trust visit to assess natural habitats at Millbrook and how to protect them
Carbon Offsetting
You might wondered why as we are a Green Tourism destination we don't offer a carbon offset scheme. We believe that by the 9000 trees we planted at Millbrook and or ongoing planting schemes that we cover this. We are not able to use this as an offical offsetting scheme as the government use any trees planted in the UK towards there own carbon offset (by use of satelitte pictures). We think this is not fair and we do not understand why we have to plant trees out of the UK! Just to let you know!
Quick Fact : Did you know that currently the UK spends 74 million pounds a year just from leaving electrical items on standby and mobile chargers plugged in when not in use!
