A plan designed to reduce the council’s impact on the environment has shown encouraging results after just two years.

The plan has seen the borough beat its targets for a number of key green factors including recycling and reducing CO2 emissions, according to a spokesman.

The council adopted the Redbridge Environmental Action Plan (REAct) in late 2010 and set itself a number of targets.

Since then it has “changed the culture” of energy conservation in schools, saving 102 tonnes of CO2 in ten schools and diverted 61.8 per cent of waste from landfill, above its 45 per cent target.

The council also helped reduce the number of children travelling to school by car to 27.4 per cent, as well as provided free or low cost energy efficiency measures for nearly 2,000 residents.