Kingswood Skis Awarded For Sustainability

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 31, 2007

Kingswood Skis Awarded For Sustainability

Lyttelton-based Kingswood Skis has won the 2007 Southern Get Sustainable Challenge Emerging Business award and also taken out the Sustainable Product Award for its bamboo-core, carbon neutral skis.

The awards, held in Christchurch today, are part of the Sustainable Business Network’s Get Sustainable Challenge, which encourages businesses to analyse their environmental and social impacts and make positive changes towards sustainability.

Winners from the Southern Region are automatically entered into the National Awards, which will be presented in Auckland in October.

Kingswood Skis is the world's first certified carbon neutral ski manufacturer.

A member of the Carbonzero.co.nz programme since July 2007, the company first measured its carbon footprint, then demonstrated it was taking active measures to reduce that footprint, and finally purchase credits to offset what they couldn’t mitigate. Those credits go towards regenerating native New Zealand bush and creating more renewable energy sources.

Some of Kingswood’s carbon-saving initiatives include sponsoring the ridesharing website, snowpool.org.nz, locating our factory within walking distance of our home and purchasing a small car for day-to-day business that can't be done by foot or by bus. They also support local energy initiatives and try to purchase our materials locally wherever possible. One of the factors in their decision to use only solid bamboo cores was the sustainability of the product.

Bamboo is an endlessly renewable resource. Many species of bamboo can grow two feet or more a day and restores itself for use in just five years and requires less energy to harvest than most timber products. Plantation bamboo requires no chemical fertilisers and when it’s harvested, a new shoot will grow in its place.

Farmed bamboo stabilizes the earth with its roots, preventing erosion. It takes in greenhouse gasses and produces oxygen - 35% more than an equivalent stand of trees.

“We figure, if skiers aren't motivated to do something about climate change, who is? We'd like the snow to stick around,” says co-owner Kris Herbert, who runs the company with her husband Alex.

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