M&S to go carbon neutral in £200m green initiative

Marks & Spencer will today seek to steal a march on its high street rivals by unveiling a £200m scheme to become one of the country's greenest retailers.

The centrepiece of the 100-point action plan is a pledge to become "carbon neutral" by 2012 - a commitment that would be the equivalent of taking 100,000 cars off the road.

M&S also aims to stop sending waste to landfill sites by that date, increase the amount of food sourced locally and regionally, increase the use of recycled materials and end the need for consumers to throw away any of its products or packaging.

The ambitious scheme - known as Plan A - was welcomed by environmental campaigners, and underscores the growing competition among high-street retailers to capture a bigger share of the "green pound".

Tesco and J Sainsbury have launched their own environmental initiatives, piloting schemes such as doorstep delivery of organic vegetable boxes and reduced use of plastic bags. Sir Terry Leahy, chief executive of Tesco, is a member of the climate change task force set up by the CBI last week.

Stuart Rose, chief executive of M&S, said: "Every business and individual needs to do their bit to tackle the enormous challenges of climate change and waste. We believe a responsible business can be a profitable business. We are calling this 'Plan A' because there is no 'Plan B'."

He said that in becoming carbon neutral, M&S would only use offsetting - the purchase of carbon credits from others - as a last resort. It intends to improve its energy efficiency by 25 per cent, power all its stores using renewable energy, and trial a technology known as anaerobic digestion, which enables electricity to be produced from food waste.

The company has also pledged to double the amount of food sourced locally over the next 12 months, minimise the amount of food imported by air, use biofuels in half its lorry fleet, reduce packaging by 25 per cent, start selling polyester clothing made only from recycled plastic bottles, and increase sales of garments made from Fairtrade cotton to 20 million this year.

Jonathon Porritt, the environmental campaigner and founding director of Forum for the Future, who advised M&S on the plan, said it "set a new benchmark" in the way business should tackle waste, fairtrade and climate change. Greenpeace and WWF also welcomed the initiative.

M&S intends to open a model "green" factory in partnership with one of its 2,000 suppliers, and three model green shops, in Glasgow, Bournemouth and Liverpool.

Mr Rose admitted that M&S had embarked on "a deliberately ambitious and, in some areas, difficult plan" but added: "Doing anything less is not an option."