Royal Berkshire Fire and Rescue Service (RBFRS) operates 12 full-time stations, four on-call stations, a training centre, and a headquarters office. As the Service progressed along its sustainability roadmap, it became clear that policies and plans alone were not enough. Embedding sustainability required shared understanding and action across the organisation, supported through education and learning to integrate decarbonisation into everyday language, decisions, and behaviours.

To enable this shift, RBFRS identified Carbon Literacy as a foundational competency for their teams. RBFRS are in the unique position of directly fighting against the impacts of a changing climate, with more calls to emergencies resulting from floods, wildfires and water rescues. Therefore an deeper understanding of their carbon costs were key to protecting their future as a service.

Having led the development of the initial sustainability roadmap, Mortice were perfectly positioned to design and deliver a bespoke Carbon Literacy training programme tailored specifically to the organisation’s needs, culture, and strategic direction.

Our Approach

We created an independent, fully customised Carbon Literacy course for RBFRS, designed to:

• Strengthen understanding of carbon emissions and their organisational impact
• Build a common language around sustainability across departments
• Equip staff with practical tools to support carbon reduction in their roles
• Deepen engagement with the sustainability strategy by connecting concepts to real, everyday actions
• Provide accredited training that reinforces RBFRS’ commitment to continuous improvement

The programme was structured as a rolling series of in-person learning days, complemented by supporting activities to ensure staff could apply their learning effectively.