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Charles Agnew is the head of sustainability and climate change adaptation at Sydney Water. He is responsible for achieving the organization’s commitment to be net carbon zero, climate change adaptation and disclosures, infrastructure resilience, and sustainability. Charles is an advocate for equity within and between generations. 
Charles Agnew, Head of Sustainability and Climate Change Adaptation, Sydney Water
Sydney Water is Australia’s largest water utility supplying high-quality drinking water to 5.3 million customers every day across Greater Sydney. Our network has been meeting the demands of the growing cities across Greater Sydney but is currently near capacity. As we plan for Greater Sydney’s growth, we will invest in infrastructure that is resilient to climate variability and its extremes, such as flood and drought and responds to our customers’ priorities, which include an affordable, sustainably delivered water supply and clean, healthy waterways.
By embracing circular economy practices, we are creating the most value from water, materials, and energy in a way that is cost-effective for our customers and reduces our impact on the environment and the climate.
Sydney Water has an ambition of achieving net zero carbon emissions across our organization by 2030 and across our supply chain by 2040. To reduce our carbon emissions, we continue to implement renewable energy projects such as biogas to electricity at our water resource recovery facilities, solar, and best practice energy performance in our operations and investment programs. Our approach to net zero emissions, uses circular economy principles, such as reusing resources to their highest value. At our Malabar Water Resource Recovery Facility, a plant has been built with our partner Jemena, in collaboration with the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA), where biogas recovered from wastewater is expected to supply renewable gas to 6,300 homes in 2023–24. By 2030, that figure will double, with the potential for manufacturing and other business uses.
"By embracing circular economy practices, we are creating the most value from water, materials, and energy in a way that is cost-effective for our customers and reduces our impact on the environment and the climate"
In addition, we are building on our commitment to global sustainability. Sydney Water continues to adopt the United Nations Global Compact and Sustainable Development Goals, which will help us measure our impact on the environment, human rights, and other aspects of corporate social responsibility.
The key elements of getting to net carbon zero include:
1. Change our electricity procurement strategy to deliver lower cost and seek zero emission power.
2. Reduce our internal emissions through energy-efficiency projects and increased renewable energy production.
3. We are working with our suppliers to ensure we reach our net zero carbon ambition by 2040. Sydney Water’s expectations around carbon emissions, air pollution, and waste generation are detailed in our Supplier Code of Conduct.
4. The Greenhouse Gas Estimation Tool has been rolled out to be used for projects during design and delivery. The carbon emissions can be assessed and opportunities to reduce emissions identified. This tool development will continue in the 2024 financial year for use in the planning phase of projects.
Link to net zero plan our path to net zero and beyond (sydneywater.com.au).
