The past is at the heart of our mission – preserving historic properties and sharing their stories is what we do at English Heritage. Yet our vision is fixed on the future. This forward-facing ethos is reflected in a wide-ranging sustainability strategy that aims to shrink our energy use by up to one-third within the next five years, reduce waste and cut single-use plastics, among other actions. And though the targets are large-scale, it’s through lots of smaller actions at individual properties, such as switching to LED light bulbs and installing smart meters to more effectively monitor where, when and how we’re using energy that we’ll hit them.

‘We’re planning to train the staff at our sites to become “green champions”,’ explains estates director Rob Woodside. ‘They’ll look at what can be done to reduce energy use and manage things such as waste recycling and procurement. We need the guys on the ground to think in these terms, because they know the properties best.’

‘Our building services managers each oversee multiple properties – one covers 60 sites in the east of England, another 11 sites in London,’ says Nicola Duncan-Finn, senior estate manager. ‘So, we’re looking to new technology to provide virtual eyes and ears on the ground.’ It also helps those local ‘green champions’, too.

‘On a large property it’s sometimes difficult to pinpoint the low-hanging fruit in terms of improving energy efficiency,’ adds Emma. ‘And that is very much the point of these smart meters: enabling site teams to own that information the same way that they check transactions through our tills or the number of visitors. They’re the ones making day-to-day and hour-to-hour choices that can make a big difference at larger properties.’

That doesn’t apply only in historic houses themselves, of course. Choices made in each English Heritage café or shop also affect sustainability.

Understanding visitors’ interests and requirements helps us to consider possible innovations, too. This year QR codes and mobile-phone technology have increasingly been used for audio tours, which is not only more hygienic, but also reduces paper use. And we’re looking at visitors’ own efforts to go green.  ‘At one site with holiday cottages, we’ve noticed a lot more guests arriving with electric cars,’ says Emma. ‘So, we’re thinking about how we might respond to that. It comes from understanding a bit more about how not just our staff and volunteers are behaving on site, but also our visitors’ needs.’

We hope the insights we’re gaining at our properties will be useful on a wider scale – not least in grasping how making small changes can have a big impact. In the same way that monitoring energy use across large historic buildings enables us to identify ways of becoming more efficient, installing a smart meter at home can show when and where you’re using power, and how savings might be made. It’s another important step in a journey towards a sustainable future.