British American Tobacco has been named the UK’s greenest company in the grocery industry for its work on reducing energy consumption.

The Environment Agency’s first CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme Performance League Table, published this week, ranks more than 2,000 organisations by what they have done to measure energy use. BAT was one of only 22 companies to score an ‘early action metric’ of 100%.

The early action metric is designed to reward organisations that have taken steps to reduce emissions before or during Phase 1 of the CRC scheme.

“We operate to the principle of resources footprint mapping prior to reduction activities and are pleased this approach has been recognised by the EA,” said Barbara Klammer, group head of global EHS at BAT.

The highest-ranked supermarket on the list was Asda, at number 37, with an early action metric of 96.82%. It was closely followed by East of England Co-op and The Co-operative Group, which both scored 95%. Tesco scored 87.5% - number 93 on the list. Of the wholesalers, Booker came top, with a score of 91.88%.

However, many grocery companies - including Kraft Foods, Northern Foods, Nisa-Today’s, Palmer & Harvey and TJ Morris - posted a ranking of 0% because they did not disclose emissions in annual reports, did not publicly disclose emission targets and did not actively engage with staff to reduce emissions.

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