Singer Instruments’ Environmental Commitment

The biggest impact we can make is to continue to produce robotics to help accelerate scientific breakthroughs towards renewable technologies. We continue to be inspired by our users’ efforts and our staff-initiated sustainability successes from the last few years demonstrate this commitment towards Net Zero.

“Inspired by, and in response to movements to stimulate action, Singer Instruments have a live Environmental Strategy. This is not a PR stunt to promote Singer Instruments, but efforts to promote environmental and ecological action and to inspire other businesses to do the same.”

Harry Singer | CEO
Singer Instruments

Engineering for Longevity

As a by-product of engineering our products for reliability and longevity, Singer Instruments have a very small (but unquantified) landfill footprint. There are MSM 100s, made 30-something years ago, still in the field, and still working! 

We were also delighted to assist Dr Jane Usher of the MRC Centre for Medical Mycology at the University of Exeter by recycling their ROTOR when she upgraded to ROTOR+ after 25 years, contributing to their Gold Leaf status for Sustainability.

Helping the local ecosystem

Sowing the Seeds

We are one of 59 sites in partnership with the Sowing the Seeds initiative run by Exmoor National Park Authority together with FWAGSW, Devon Wildlife Trust, South West Water and others to create new wildflower meadows across Exmoor. A grant from the Farming in Protected Landscapes Fund enabled us to re-fence the Potato Field (a field which hasn’t contained potatoes in quite a while) adjacent to our HQ in Roadwater so we could welcome Exmoor Ponies to graze the steep field. Wildflower seeds, harvested from local donor sites, were then sown.

Exmoor Ponies, mentioned in the Domesday Book, are renowned worldwide for their skilled conservation grazing and hardiness. They keep the grass in check, eat through brambles and scrub, and provide fertiliser for the seeds. It may take another couple of years for the wildflower meadow to become established and more Exmoor Pony visits will be required (Oh no…so sad), but the benefit to the local flora and fauna will be worth it.

Rehoming the bees

Last Spring no fewer than FIVE swarms of bees were safely and carefully collected by a local bee keeper from our HQ in Roadwater and given new homes. For some reason the bees all wanted to play with our staff on our outdoor break area – must be the jam sandwiches. Rather than call in an exterminator we opted for a relocation programme enabling the bees to thrive and continue to help our wildflower Potato Field to thrive.

Taking our business digital

Reduce our global travel

The distances that we ship our demo fleet of robots has reduced now that we have multiple instruments stationed in our overseas offices. Online demonstrations have reduced the carbon footprint of live product demonstrations to customers, with little detriment to our customers’ experiences.

Where possible, our products are supported remotely, reducing the carbon footprint of support. When we do need to fly, our preferred airport is Bristol; they are actively reducing their CO2 emissions and are committed to being carbon neutral by 2025. Our airline of choice is KLM, ranked the Most Sustainable Airline by the Dow Jones Sustainability Index. 

Sales went paperless

All previously printed documentation for every sales order (piles of paper) is now stored digitally. This is great for our paper consumption, our bottom line, and we’ve saved on physical storage space. This system ensures quick, easy, and remote reference to documentation for our Finance and Logistics teams.

Reducing our reliance on fossil fuels

Going 100% green energy

We are committed to renewable energy and chose to become a customer of one of Europe’s leading investors in green energy. Octopus Energy have over 100 awards including their affordability, customer service, green innovation and being great places to work; they align with our values.

Upgrading to reduce power usage 

• Replacing 3 dehumidifiers in our storage units for newer models saved over £400 in the first year after purchase, and over £800 each following year by almost halving their power usage!
• All our facilities are fitted with modern air-to-air heat exchange units to reduce the energy consumption of heating buildings during the winter.  
• All lighting was upgraded to high-efficiency LED; 58% more efficient and longer lifetime than fluorescent counterparts.

Down to the basics

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

We recycle all cardboard, food waste, paper, plastic, tins, electronics, batteries, and metals on both our sites. Wherever possible we offer items to staff to be reused when we no longer need them. We also commonly choose to use aluminium in our manufacturing because it is so widely recyclable.

Compostable transit brackets

Brackets for our PIXL Series and MSM were previously big, pricey to machine, and needed special tools to remove – a real headache for customers. Switching to 3D printed PLA gave us a plant-based, compostable alternative that’s much easier (and cheaper) to print on demand. We’re keeping a ton of single-use plastic out of landfills each year, seeing lower material costs, zero tooling downtime, and faster turnaround on replacements.

Reducing H&S risks

Replacing hazardous substances

This year, we investigated the top 25 hazardous items in our COSHH register to see if there were safer, more environmentally friendly substances, or alternative processes we could test. As a result 12 products were removed from our business. We even replaced one that had 7 hazards for a substance with 3, AND it performed better than the original one. We’ll be repeating this annually to find more environmentally friendly and safer options.

IPA (not the fun kind unfortunately)

We investigated the possibility of recycling our isopropyl alcohol (IPA) for reuse rather than disposal. A distiller was purchased for £100 less than one waste collection of IPA, and within 50 minutes had turned 3 litres of dirty IPA into 2.75 litres of re-usable product. We no longer have to store volumes of dirty IPA awaiting collection; vehicle use for the delivery of new and collection of dirty IPA has been drastically reduced; and the entire process is now cheaper (Bonus!).

Chloroform goes “night, night”

One of the parts for both our MSM and SporePlay+ required the use of chloroform during the finishing process. Chloroform is pretty nasty stuff. Together with an external company we spent a year testing trial parts before purchasing a resin printer and producing them in-house without the need for chloroform. In July 2023 1.9 litres of chloroform left the building forever, eliminating the requirement to use and store it on the premises, and removing a significant risk to staff.