Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG)

At Shoal we understand delivering capability in complex environments can bring risk within projects, to our clients and our team. We strive to reduce risk in our delivery and have a positive impact on the community in which we operate.

Led by our company values, Shoal believes that ESG goes beyond sustainability and corporate social responsibility. It addresses the challenges we face as a company and how we engage with our staff, clients, suppliers and the community.

Our environment and sustainability

In 2021, Shoal became the first systems engineering firm to be certified Carbon Neutral by Climate Active, joining 180 Australian organisations that have proven that they  are measuring, reducing and offsetting their emissions, with a net result of zero emissions.

Our journey towards certification began in 2019, inspired by our team’s discussion at an Ideas Club session. By 2020, we had measured our carbon footprint and were well on our way to gain certification through Climate Active. Today, our journey continues, with ideas and accountabilities to ensure that we incorporate consideration of our impact on the environment into our decision making.

We have made choices and changes in the way we do business to reduce our carbon emissions as much as possible. We then purchase carbon offsets to take responsibility for our unavoidable emissions and become carbon neutral. We drew from our company values to select our offset projects; self-awareness and sociability.

At Shoal, self-awareness means developing ourselves and each other. Sociability involves connection, building relationships and engaging with the community.

Shoal has a climate-conscious workforce, who are personally motivated to take action on environmental issues and enabled in the workplace to do the same. Carbon neutral certification is an important driver of workplace satisfaction and engagement, as well as another differentiator for new recruits. Some of the markets we operate in require evidence of environmental credentials, so accreditation has commercial benefits too.

Read more in our Public Disclosure Statement FY2021-22.

As we also operate across Australia and New Zealand, we chose an offset project that involves climate action in both countries.

Shoal invest in offset projects where benefits extend beyond offset of carbon emissions, to reflect our values:

Greenfleet

Greenfleet is an organisation that protect the environment and climate through reforestation activities in Australia and New Zealand. While Greenfleet is focused on environmental outcomes, they also have additional community benefits including job creation, community engagement and biodiversity and endangered species protection.

Tiwi Islands, NT, Aboriginal Savanna Burning Project, The Aboriginal Carbon Foundation

Savanna burning is a fire management method that reduces the frequency and extent of dry late season bushfires (prevalent in tropical savannas of northern Australia) by reducing the fuel load in a controlled manner and therefore reducing greenhouse gas emissions. By practicing traditional patchwork burning in the early dry season when fires are cooler and by burning less country, fewer emissions are released and more carbon is sequestered in dead organic matter, soil, and plants, keeping the land healthy for the Tiwi people.

The Aboriginal Carbon Foundation is a not for profit that connects Aboriginal communities with organisations seeking offsets. They provide training for Indigenous rangers and support traditional land management. They deliver many core benefits including social, cultural, environmental, political, economic and community health. This savanna burning project provides local employment opportunities and enables the protection of local native flora and fauna, and importantly sacred sites.

Satara Wind Power Project in Maharashtra, India

This wind farm, located at Chilarewadi in the Satara District, Maharashtra has a capacity of 75 MW and reduces the reliance of the area on fossil fuel burning power plants. The wind farm is expected to generate 144540 MWh of clean electricity when fully operational and contribute to a greenhouse gas emission reduction of approximately 137703 tCO2-e annually, for a period of 10 years. The project will result in continued employment opportunities for local communities through construction and operational phases of the project, and result in further infrastructure development in the region including roads. Re-investment of revenue from the sale of Certified Emission Reductions (CERs) from the project will used to develop public amenities and infrastructure in the region including water distribution, sanitation, schools, hospitals and health check centres, and distribution of educational books and school uniforms.

Rimba Raya Biodiversity Reserve Project

Rimba Raya is situated in Central Kalimantan, Indonesian Borneo and is one of the largest REDD+ peat swamp forest projects in the world, avoiding nearly 130 million tonnes of carbon emissions. Covering land approximately the same size as Singapore, it provides a buffer zone between the palm oil industry and the Tanjung Putting National Park, home to one of the last remaining wild populations of orangutans on earth. Rimba Raya provides alternative income streams through capacity building, investments in micro-finance, programs that provide basic necessities and access to a conservation model that does not put the developing world’s need for economic growth at odds with our collective desire to protect a fragile ecosystem. This offers a viable alternative to deforestation, a practice common in the area. Rimba Raya is home to over 300 species of birds, 122 species of mammals and 180 species of trees and plants. The project has strong ties to community based initiatives including increased employment for the community, greater access to medical and health services, and assistance with education.

Orana Park Natural Capital Units, Bendigo

284 Natural Capital Units have also been purchased to continue our support of Australian biodiversity preservation and restoration projects. Orana Park is a 4,500ha farm northwest of Bendigo, Victoria owned and operated by the Tiverton Agriculture Impact Fund (TAIF). TAIF’s work with Orana Park will see the full restoration of riparian vegetation along the banks of the 33km Loddon river as well as a purpose-built wildlife sanctuary. Orana Sanctuary has been built for Australian threatened species protection and breeding on 200ha of predator-proof land. The sanctuary will become a new home for the critically endangered Eastern Bettong and Bush Stone Curlew incubation and recovery programs.

Social

One of our Values at Shoal is ‘sociability’. To us, sociability means supporting each other, seeking connections, starting conversations, building relationships and engaging with our community. As a team, we like to support causes (like the Cancer Council and Australia’s biggest morning tea, Movember, Foodbank drives and Rail RU OK? Day). One of the contributions we are most proud of is a project we call ‘Tackling Poverty Holistically’.

Indigenous Action Plan Working Group

At Shoal we recognised that our Indigenous Action Plan needed to consist of relevant and tangible action items that would have real impact. We took inspiration from Reconciliation Australia’s dimensions of national reconciliation and have built an Indigenous Action Plan that focuses on two key objectives ‘Enhancing race relations through historical awareness’ and ‘Equality’. We will continue to evolve our action plan as we develop greater cultural awareness and understand the steps we can take as individuals and as an organization.

So far, we have embarked on a group knowledge sharing exercise to better understand the local Traditional Owners or Custodians of the lands where Shoal staff reside and work, so that our Acknowledgement of Country held real context and meaning and we be pay our respects by adding an Acknowledgment of Country to our meetings and events.

As a company that values education and ongoing learning, particularly in the field of STEM, our Indigenous Action Working Group members are undertaking cultural awareness training to help build towards a plan to provide meaningful educational opportunities to support Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students.

At Shoal we believe there is real value in even the smallest steps and hope to make a meaningful difference by driving positive change within our sphere of influence.  We look forward to building on our action plan year after year as we go on the journey to collectively build relationships and communities that value Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, histories, cultures, and futures.

Governance

Shoal’s systems and processes allow us to manage operational quality and risk management.

Quality Management System

Our ISO 9001:2015-certified Quality Management System, encompasses industry best practice. This ensures that we will meet and sustain consistent quality outcomes across personnel, services, and deliverables to clients.

It is maintained through our corporate continuous improvement processes and is regularly audited internally, as well as externally to ensure continued compliance with ISO standards.

Essential 8

The Essential 8 is a list of essential cyber security mitigation strategies published by the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC). The ACSC recommends the implementation of these essential eight strategies as a baseline to make it harder for adversaries to compromise systems.

Shoal has committed to implementing the Essential 8 strategies and is working to ensure compliance. Through this commitment the company recognises the importance of ensuring the safety of our systems and protection from cyber threats for the benefit of our clients, the company, and our staff.