Mark Anderson: Wake up to a taste of eco-friendly Norwegian spring water

What better way to wake up than with a biodegradable carton of fresh water from a spring in southern Norway?

As part of our environmental commitment, Go-Ahead has replaced complementary plastic water bottles with environmentally friendly water cartons on our sleeper trains, which operate in southern Norway.

The cartons are 88% plant-based and are recyclable, reducing the need to throw away thousands of plastic bottles every year. The water comes from Telemark, a county in southern Norway known for its forests, valleys and mountains.

They will be placed in every sleeping berth on our overnight rail service, which runs between Oslo, in the east of the country, and Stavanger, in the west. The typical journey time is just under nine hours.

Under our climate change strategy, Go-Ahead is looking for multiple small initiatives to reduce waste and improve re-use. We have pledged to increase the proportion of waste recycled in our business to 60% by 2025, and to 80% by 2035.

Other recycling initiatives across Go-Ahead’s operations include “Project Go Eco” under which our bus company, Go-Ahead London, introduced better segregation for paper, cardboard and general waste left on London buses. We’ve succeeded in increasing the level of waste recycling at Go-Ahead London from 5.5% to 33%.

And GTR, our UK rail company, has introduced a mobile segregation unit at Brighton station – increasing the rate of recycling at the busy seaside terminus to 90%.