Sustainability and risk management

Sustainability

For more than 60 years Peab has contributed to sustainable social development and worked to improve everyday life for people in the local community. We do this by building everything from homes, schools and hospitals to bridges, roads and other infrastructure. Working sustainably is a strategic matter for Peab that in practice always takes place locally, connected to everyday life based on our core values, business concept, mission, strategic targets and Code of Conduct.

As of 2021 we monitor our business based on nine external targets – both financial and non-financial targets – that also identify our prioritized sustainable aspects. We monitor our targets quarterly, semiannually or annually. In addition to our financial targets we quarterly monitor workplace accidents and our target of zero fatal accidents and a contracting trend of serious accidents.

Best workplace

Serious accidents

A safe work environment is the foundation of our business. Everyone at our workplaces should be able to be there under safe and secure conditions, despite the fact that there are risks involved in the work we do. In order to prevent accidents and incidents at our workplaces we develop quality-ensured work methods and train our employees. Focus is on planning and risk assessment in projects as well as learning from the reported risk observations, incidents and accidents.

The number of serious accidents* at our workplaces over a rolling twelve month period amounted to 30 per September 30, 2021 (30 per June 30, 2021), of which 12 involved our own personnel and 18 involved subcontractors. During the period July to September 2021 the total number of serious accidents was 12. Peab employs a high portion of our own skilled workers compared to other actors in the construction and civil engineering industry, in addition to our many subcontractors. At the end of September 2021 Peab had 15,648 employees, of which 8,656 were skilled workers. As of 2021 we also monitor the number of workplace accidents with more than four days absence, excluding the day of injury (LTI4), and workplace accidents according to the same definition per one million hours worked (LTIF4) for our own employees. In the third quarter the number amounted to 36 (43 second quarter 2021) and the LTIF4 frequency rate was 6.6 (6.6 second quarter 2021).

Every remedied risk is one less potential accident, which is why we are highly focused on reporting and remedying risk observations*. During the third quarter 2021 the organization reported 15,500 risk observations, which brought the total number of reported risk observations for the first nine months of 2021 to 48,750.

* For a definition see section Alternative performance measures and definitions.

Attractive employers (eNPS)

We will be the obvious choice for anyone who wants to work in the industry. Everyone will be part of safe and including workplaces with good work conditions and opportunities to develop at Peab. Twice a year we hold our personnel survey The Handshake so that we can continuously develop and improve as co-workers and teams. The questions in The Handshake mainly concern productivity, the team’s sustainability and if employees are willing to recommend Peab as an employer to friends and acquaintances (eNPS). The latter is also one of our nine external targets that we report twice a year.

Participation in the spring survey was a record-breaking 85 percent in the Group, accompanied by many suggestions for improvement. This shows the great interest our employees have in contributing to developing our business.

Within the strategic target Best workplace the eNPS (recommend Peab) value should be above the benchmark. The eNPS value for the Group has gone up slightly (+1) since the previous evaluation and was at 19 in the spring survey. This is clearly above the Nordic benchmark for our industry (Industry) which is 10. There was a slight downturn in the response from white-collar workers in Sweden. On the other hand development is positive on the side of skilled workers in Sweden as well as skilled and white-collar workers in Norway and Finland. The next eNPS will be presented in the year-end report for 2021.

Leader in social responsibility

Activities during the third quarter

• Peab has continued to test lignin in several places in the Nordic region. Successful test stretches were paved with lignin in semi-warm soft asphalt on Road 205 at Loka Brunn in Bergslagen. Peab paved another test stretch in collaboration with Forshaga Municipality and yet another in Finnish Kajaani. Lignin is the natural binder in wood and helps reduce Peab’s climate footprint as it partially replaces oil-based bitumen.
• Commissioned by Tingsryd Municipality Peab paved roads with asphalt containing 97.6 percent reclaimed asphalt pavement. Measurements showed that by using cold mix technology the environmental impact was reduced by 70 percent. In addition to saving natural resources reclaimed asphalt pavement cuts down on transportation since mobile asphalt plants can be used near to worksites.
• Peab participates in research to increase safety in roadwork. In order to systematically gather and spread cross-industry knowledge and experience regarding incidents and improvements, scientists from The Swedish Road and Transport Research Institute together with Peab and other actors have proposed a joint database that collects accident statistics from contractors and consultants that work with and on roads.
• Peab has decided that going forward all our own housing development projects in Finland will be developed according to energy class A.
• Peab has updated guidelines for managing surplus material in order to reuse more of it while preventing violations of laws and Peab’s Code of Conduct.
• Peab is the first major construction and civil engineering company to sign a framework contract with the reuse actors Återbruket and Återbyggdepå for recycling in Gothenburg and Malmö. The purpose is to further reduce waste and increase circularity by recycling and reusing surplus material. Surplus material from construction sites such as doors, windows and kitchen furnishings can now be reused through these two partners.
• Together with Beijer Byggmaterial and Wihlborgs Peab has also started a pilot project for reuse of timber from construction sites. As part of the concept Gentræ Peab collects timber which can no longer be used in projects from construction sites and turns it over to Beijer that ensures as much as possible becomes resalable instead of ending up in a dumpster.
• Peab’s susbsidiary Lambertsson is first in Sweden to offer its customers a completely electric mobile crane on caterpillar tracks. There are only three of them in the world.
• Peab issued green bonds for a total value of 1.5 billion Swedish kronor. These funds will primarily finance investments in energy efficient buildings, ECO products and more environmentally adapted production, green transportation and water and waste management. The purpose of the issue is to contribute to Peab’s work on climate neutrality and resource efficiency.
• Peab has held our annual work environment week. The theme this year was lift and load ergonomics.