Vauxhall strengthens environmental credentials with honey produced on-site

In 2019, Vauxhall began to work with local beekeepers and established an apiary consisting of five honeybee hives on the Ellesmere Port site. The local beekeepers maintain the apiary all year round and collect the honey each autumn. Some of the honey from the site is jarred and branded with the Vauxhall griffin to be shared with employees and VIP guests visiting the plant. The rest is independently sold by the beekeepers with 10% of profits donated to local charities on Vauxhall’s behalf. The rest of the profit is reinvested into the apiary.

Parts of the Ellesmere Port site have already been designated to be turned into wild meadows, which will be planted with trees. Vauxhall has also committed to protecting the wetlands on site at Ellesmere Port. A lagoon by the factory’s effluent treatment plant already attracts several native bird species.The honeybee apiary is one of four ongoing biodiversity programmes at Ellesmere Port. The other projects include bird boxes and feeders to attract local bird species such as a family of Peregrine Falcons that live on site. A ‘bug hotel’ was also built next to the apiary to provide a nesting site for insects and pollinators. A forest project has been created to preserve the local flora and fauna.

Thanks to these ongoing conservation efforts, the Ellesmere Port plant has been certified by the Wildlife Habitat Council (WHC) since 2010, achieving Silver standard in 2019. WHC is an international non-governmental organisation that provides a framework for voluntary conservation action. The plant was the first in Europe to achieve this certification.

Emma Brady, Environmental Engineer at Vauxhall’s Ellesmere Port plant, said: “We have been committed to maintaining and protecting the local biodiversity, through four different programmes around the site. We are also very proud to have had our efforts recognised yet again with a Silver standard certification from the WHC.”

“Since 2019, we’ve had five beehives on the site and we are excited to be able to share the final product from the busy bees with the plant’s employees. We are also thrilled to be able to support a local charity during these difficult times with 10% of the profits from the sale of our honey set to be donated later this year”.

VAUXHALL MOTORS
Vauxhall Motors started making vehicles in the UK in 1903. Today, as the oldest and most familiar of Britain’s automotive manufacturers, its philosophy is to build vehicles that are relevant to all. Vauxhall’s two manufacturing plants in Ellesmere Port and Luton produced 120,000 cars and vans in 2019, and its sales accounted for 7.5 per cent of the UK market.

Vauxhall has been a Groupe PSA brand since 2017. By 2024, each of its models will offer an electrified version, part of the company’s PACE! plan to become sustainably profitable, global and electric. www.vauxhall.co.uk

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