Martin is a Chartered Arboriculturist and joined Chevron Green Consultancy at inception as Director in 2021 having previously led an arboriculture and environmental consultancy business for seven years. Before that, Martin worked for Tier 1 contractors in strategic asset management, combining his technical experience with a strategic approach to his work

What is your role within Chevron Green Services?
I am the Director and divisional lead of Chevron Green Consultancy which is a division of Chevron Green Services, providing professional advisory services to our clients. My role involves working with our exceptional arboricultural and environmental specialists to deliver the services required from our clients. I also work on developing our current services and providing new services where required. A big part of my role is to look at how we innovate and embrace new technology. As industry leaders we are constantly looking at how we can improve process and deliver efficiencies, whilst continuing to provide the high standard of work our clients expect.

Tell us about Chevron Green Services
Chevron Green Services provide environmental consultancy, arboriculture services and commercial vegetation management throughout the UK. We have been managing and maintaining our landscapes and natural environment for almost twenty years. In that time, we have built our reputation on knowledge, respect and appreciation for the green spaces that make up our beautiful land.

Our mission is to protect them while also ensuring that they are maintained in such a way that they do not endanger road users or the general public.

Chevron Green Consultancy is driven by the desire to work with clients to save them time, money and resources while at the same time, protecting the environment.

We started out primarily in the highways sector but we see an opportunity to bring our expertise to the rail sector, working with clients who need our operational experience in grass and hedge management, arboriculture and tree works, de-vegetation and landscaping services as well as clients who would benefit from our professional advice and consultancy services.

How have your products and services developed over the years?
The Consultancy team have been providing arboricultural surveys, landscape management, tree and vegetation services since 2014. Understanding the interactions of nature and that no one specimen lives in isolation, we grew to incorporate an ecological and environmental consultancy capacity into our portfolio, dovetailing them both into the blended services which we can offer today.

We embrace technology where possible within our sector and have certainly moved forward from paper based onsite data gathering. Now we’re using digital, phone and tablet recording. We’re also looking at how we can use technology within our environmental and arboricultural roles to provide long term data gathering surveys and remote sensing. Not only does this
have an environmental benefit in reducing footfall on site, but it also provides us, and our clients with more accurate data. This is an emerging market, but the potential usefulness of the information harvested is extremely exciting and will have significant benefits in helping our clients deliver more sustainable services.

What types of companies do you collaborate on projects with?
As with technology and innovation, we embrace collaboration in all its guises, whether that is internally between the arboriculture and ecological parts of the business, the professional services and operational divisions or with contractors and subcontractors.

We have been involved in some key alliance collaborations, with multiple disciplines and multiple companies working together in regional areas and externally with individual contractors on singular and multi-disciplinary projects.

We also have several accreditations and allegiances with charity organisations including Grown in Britain and the Species Recovery Trust. Our work with these organisations ensures we’re lending our expertise to the companies that can help effect change beyond our industry. We are delighted to be able to support these charities in a practical way.

We recently started a project with Anglia Ruskin University and the Peoples Trust for Endangered Species to co-deliver a research project into the use of cameras for small mammal surveys. This knowledge exchange and innovative approach is fundamental to the perspective we take at Chevron Green Services. If successful, we’ll share our findings to help the industry as a whole develop mammal survey best practice in more sustainable and environmentally friendly ways.

What types of companies do you collaborate on projects with?
As with technology and innovation, we embrace collaboration in all its guises, whether that is internally between the arboriculture and ecological parts of the business, the professional services and operational divisions or with contractors and subcontractors.

We have been involved in some key alliance collaborations, with multiple disciplines and multiple companies working together in regional areas and externally with individual contractors on singular and multi-disciplinary projects.

We also have several accreditations and allegiances with charity organisations including Grown in Britain and the Species Recovery Trust. Our work with these organisations ensures we’re lending our expertise to the companies that can help effect change beyond our industry. We are delighted to be able to support these charities in a practical way.

We recently started a project with Anglia Ruskin University and the Peoples Trust for Endangered Species to co-deliver a research project into the use of cameras for small mammal surveys. This knowledge exchange and innovative approach is fundamental to the perspective we take at Chevron Green Services. If successful, we’ll share our findings to help the industry as a whole develop mammal survey best practice in more sustainable and environmentally friendly ways.

What are some of the biggest challenges this sector currently faces?
There are several challenges within the environmental industry none of which are easy to resolve or are any less challenging than the next. I know from first-hand experience that one of our challenges has been the skills shortage currently enveloping the arboricultural, forestry and environmental sectors, for both the operations and professional services divisions.

Currently everything and everyone requires as a quick fix without much thought placed on retaining mature habitats, ancient woodlands, mature and veteran trees, marshlands, heathlands, and mature grasslands, but instead would remove these natural assets and replace them with some new ones close by or by planting a few trees as mitigation.

Often the trees are planted in locations which are unsuitable, or the wrong species has been selected or the aftercare operations are not completed to a satisfactory standard, these factors all result in the planting schemes failing.

The real problem lies in the loss of relationships, habitats and loss of ecosystems that have been built by the living organisms in these mature habitats over several decades or even hundreds of years. These cannot be re-engineered by planting a few trees nearby.

A mature oak tree can provide habitat for hundreds of species above ground with birds, caterpillars, spiders, moths, beetles, squirrels, bats, insects, mosses, liverworts and over 300 species of lichens. Whilst underground mycorrhizal fungi interactions provide a symbiotic relationship which is developed through years of cohabitation. These are the losses which are hurting the
biodiversity in the UK, and these are the losses which will take decades to recover.

Do you think the rail industry could be greener and what is your organisation’s green strategy?
Absolutely. It is our responsibility as an industry to collectively work on ways to create a sustainable future. It requires a shift in mindset from everyone, not just in the approach to financing projects, but also in terms of truly embracing sustainable strategies and embracing the mature habitats within our landscape.

We can, as in other infrastructure industries, look at the mature habitats and look to preserve, enhance them in line with best practices, whilst also looking outside of the rail estate boundaries to see where enhancement of the wider landscape and environment can be undertaken. The linear assets can be connected to provide linked ecosystems within the borders and then further linked to embrace the wider landscape and the natural assets located nearby.

Chevron Green Services’ mission is to help provide biodiverse habitats for generations to come, which encompasses the vision of habitats to have the allowance to grow into thriving mature eco communities.

How can we make the rail industry a place people want to work in?
We need to demonstrate to the prospective worker, operative, designer, engineer that the rail industry is innovative, at the forefront of technology not just for the rail itself but also for all the other disciplines working daily within the confines of the rail estate boundary.

The rail industry needs to highlight its safety standards and innovations, the environmental advances, the social value of the networks and working within the industry, well-being and health advances and benefits for works whilst showing that this is a growth industry not just for now but one that is forward thinking and will be a rewarding challenge for years to come.

What are your views on collaborative working?
We embrace collaboration at all levels, I would struggle to find any of our projects delivered over the past couple of years which has not had some degree of collaboration involved in the successful design, mobilisation, delivery, and conclusion of it.

Every step of the project process can and has been enhanced by discussing and implementing the view, experiences, knowledge, and competencies of others either within our organisation, our supply chain partners, our client base or even with our competitors. I do believe that collaboration widens the competency pool and if managed effectively and more importantly openly, it is an unbelievably valuable asset and key to operational success.

At some point, every company will face the question of how to continue maximising earnings from their current business practice whilst also investing enough in innovation so they can turn a profit in the future. How can a company achieve the necessary creativity to innovate without compromising their existing business?

Employees are the be all and end all of a company, especially in a consultancy where the service is the employees themselves. There are a couple of well-known and used phrases: ‘look after the employees and they will look after the clients’ and ‘train people well enough so they can leave, treat them well enough so they don’t want to’ these work just the same for creativity, innovation, ideas, and investment into the company.

Many of my staff have been with me for a while now and I ensure they are looked after, respected, encouraged and empowered to speak up and informed of all things that are happening within the division through regular meetings, updates, and discussions.

Sometimes the best, most simple and effective ideas come from the newest member of the staff and therefore I would say the best way to succeed, is to listen to the ones that are helping you push forward.