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Creative Craft Studio finalises for the prestigious VIBES Awards for Scotland 2023
Creative Craft Studio finalises for the prestigious VIBES Awards for Scotland 2023
Twists Glass Studio in the Scottish Borders, are delighted to have been included as a finalist in the Energy Transition Scotland Category.
Michael James Hunter, the main person behind their successful environment policy, that began in 1998 when he founded his creative glass studio in Selkirk with his wife Sue. Winning a Vibes award in 2003 for Recycling and Caring for the Environment. We introduced the policies, recycle, reuse, and remake, encouraging us to continue with our efforts.
Our new policy, was to combine a climate change environment strategy with well designed hand crafted products. These new designs had to fit into our branding “Twists Studio Glass, British Luxury at its Very Best” and became an ongoing challenge and ultimately a way of thinking. In 2006 knowing that a glass melting furnace was an inefficient use of energy and a large polluter
of emissions when burning 24/7. Also a glass melting furnace, gas or electric, is non productive for least 16 hours a day.
This was a wake up call, and changed our way of thinking, we introduced policies to Diversify, Reduce with Reinvent at the forefront of our thinking processes. Our current policy is, Innovation = Responsible Production, Responsible Consumption. Our goal to reduce our energy consumption to reduce emissions has proven successful. On July 16th, 2022 we turned off our glass-melting furnace allowing our gas consumption to be controllable, greatly reducing our CO2.
On July 15th, 2023 we will have gone 12 months without having our melting furnace on. Cutting energy and emissions whilst still being productive. its been a huge learning curb, one we are still researching, learning something new everyday.
We still have a long way to go as to what’s possible, its been a challenging journey taking well over a decade to accomplish. Glass cannot be blown cold, obviously great heat is needed to be able to work it. By proving our new working practices can work we have successfully reduced our consumption simply by using equipment we already have, turning it on and off as and when we require. Thus eliminating a large portion of the studios wasted energy leading to a natural reduction in emissions.
We believe that there is only one way to work towards Net Zero, and that is turn it off when not in use. Action = reduction = sustainability. One small change of habit can make a difference over the long term.