Dr. Matthew Richardson, veterinary practice owner and director of the Veterinary Sustainability Alliance, joins Dr. Andy Roark to address a growing challenge in veterinary medicine: how clinics can reduce their environmental impact without sacrificing patient care or profitability. He breaks down healthcare’s carbon footprint and shares practical, real-world changes clinics can implement, from energy-efficient upgrades to reducing anesthetic gases. They also introduce the Green PAW Certification, a step-by-step program designed to help practices take measurable, sustainable action.

Links: https://veterinarysustainabilityalliance.org

Dr. Richardson holds a BA in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, a PhD in Zoology and a DVM degree. He is a small animal practitioner licensed in British Columbia and Ontario, owns The Animal Cinic in Toronto and has a special interest in environmentally sustainable practice. The Animal Clinic was the first clinic in North America to receive the Green Paw Certification for sustainability. He is the Past-President of the OVMA and The Farley Foundation, the co-founder and chair of the OVMA’s Sustainability Committee, Director of the Veterinary Sustainability Alliance and member of the CVMA Sustainability Advisory Group. A keen year-round cyclist and advocate for active transportation, Dr. Richardson can often be found on his bike or with a camera in his hand (or sometimes both).

Welcome everybody to the Kone of Shame Veterinary podcast.

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I am your host, Dr.

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And guys on this Thursday after Earth Day.

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I am so happy to bring you

this interview with Dr.

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Matthew Richardson.

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Matthew is, , one of the directors of

the Veterinary Sustainability Alliance.

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He is someone I met earlier this year.

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He's a neat guy.

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He's a practice owner that manages

to kind of set it up so that he works

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half the time and he's off the other

half of the time and he's just, he

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rides his bike to the clinic and

he's just built this green practice.

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And, , he's working with, , the Veterinary

Sustainability Alliance to launch the

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Green Paw Certification, which is a

certification, , throughout North America.

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His hope is that , the certification

will give people some guidance on how

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to make their vet practice greener.

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I have a, I really enjoy

this conversation with him.

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He gives a ton of examples of things

that they do in their practice

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and their practices can do to

make them more environmentally

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friendly, and it's just, it's just.

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Good stuff.

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It's one of those things where it's,

, small, intentional, incremental mo

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multifocal actions that build up to,

to, to having a significant impact.

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And so anyway, I, this made me really

happy to talk with Matthew guys.

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I hope people will enjoy this.

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I know a lot of people are out there

looking at their practices and saying.

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I, I would like to, I would like to, I'd

like to do a little bit better for the

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environment , and I think this is a great

episode to give you some ideas and some

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encouragement on how you can do that.

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So anyway, without further

ado, let's get into it.

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Kelsey Beth Carpenter: This is your show.

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We're glad you're here.

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We want to help you in

your veterinary career.

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Welcome to the Cone of Shame with Dr.

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Andy Roark.

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Andy: Ooh, welcome to the podcast, Dr.

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Matthew Richardson.

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How are you?

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Matthew: I am doing great,

Andy, how are you doing today?

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Andy: I am doing fantastic.

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I really appreciate you

making time to be here.

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You are a neat guy, and I'm really glad

that we got to sit down and talk a bit.

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So for those who don't know you

well, you and I, we just met

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earlier this year in Toronto.

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I was at the OVMA, , convention

there, which is always a

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Matthew: the, during

the depths of winter it

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Andy: It was, it was like, it

was like, Hey, let's have a

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conference in Toronto in January.

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, that'll be great.

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And so anyway, but they,

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Matthew: every, it happens every year.

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Every year.

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There's terrible weather, so.

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Andy: It's one of my favorite conferences.

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It really is.

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I, I, the people are so wonderful

and they always have a really great

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program and it just, I, I joke, but

also I really do love that conference.

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you and I met there you are the director

of the Veterinary Sustainability Alliance.

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You were on the OVMA Environmental

Sustainability Committee and you were also

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an independent veterinary practice owner

who, who works about every other week.

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, you like work two weeks on and

two weeks off and you have

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got a really neat thing going.

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And so I, first of all.

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I love that you're someone

who can run your own business

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and be there half the time.

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I think that's awesome.

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I really am trying to

preach to people these days.

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I think there's a narrative that

independent practice owners have

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less freedom than other people.

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And I, I don't think that that's true.

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I think that there could be more freedom

and independent practice ownership,

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and I just want people to know that.

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And then the other thing is, I'm

really interested in your work with

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the Veterinary Sustainability Alliance.

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so let me just sort of, lemme sort

of Pause, kind of there and just

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say, why don't you, why don't you

take me out just a little bit and

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tell me about what the, , veterinary

Sustainability Alliance actually is

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and how much, space that encompasses.

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Matthew: So, the Veterinary Sustainability

Alliance is a North American group.

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, we have, think eight directors right

now, , four from Canada, four from the

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us accompanying veterinarians who are

in academia, private practice, research.

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and we are all, , obviously

very passionate about the

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impact that veterinary medicine.

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Has on the environment and, , the impact

that our actions have on the environment.

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So we are, , we've partnered with

both CVMA and A VMA to develop a

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framework for sort of how to be more

sustainable in veterinary medicine.

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, and we just recently launched our

green PA certification where clinics

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can, , become, , certified as a green paw

practice for sustainability initiatives.

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Andy: How bad are vet

practices for the environment?

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And I, and to , be honest with me.

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'cause I've thought about this, right?

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I am.

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So, I am an avid outdoorsman.

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I love to camp, I love to hike.

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I love to, I really love to garden.

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I care about the environment and also

I'm busy and I work, you know, and I work

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in the practice and we, and we're moving

quickly and we're trying to be efficient.

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And I also live in South Carolina, which

the government support for, you know,

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environmental programs is, is, is wanting.

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So like they ended public

recycling programs.

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Two to three years ago at this point.

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And so anyway, like that's, that's

kinda the environment that I'm in.

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And so I'm looking this and

I'm looking at what we do.

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And I'll be honest with you,

Matthew, I'm kind of, I'm, I don't,

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I think I'm a little bit unclear,

I think on how bad is vet medicine

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as opposed to say other industries.

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And then really like what are

the big drivers of environmental

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impact that, that I'm unaware of?

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Matthew: It's sort of the dirty

secret of, of veterinary medicine.

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, and there's sort of

three big points on that.

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, one is that just medical care in general

is not environmentally friendly, right?

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, globally 5% of greenhouse gas emissions

are due to the healthcare sector.

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In the United States, it's eight

and a half percent of greenhouse

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gas emissions are due to healthcare.

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As a veterinarian, we should

be acknowledging that pet

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ownership and meat production

are not environmentally friendly.

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If we think about dogs and cats

living in the United States,

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they are big meat consumers.

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And so the greenhouse gas.

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, production , of dogs and cats in, , the

United States is the equivalent of

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heating about 10 million homes a year.

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Andy: Wow.

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I, no, no,

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Matthew: yeah.

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And, here's a great statistic.

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I think, , if dogs and cats in

the United States were their own

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country, they would be the fifth

largest meat consumer in the world,

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Andy: that's a great stat.

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That's mind vending.

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I have to sit and, and

think about what that means

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Matthew: And, and, I'm not sitting

here up here on an ivory throne

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looking down on people, right?

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I have two large breed dogs.

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I've had large breed dogs all my life.

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I love large breed dogs.

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I love a good dog that you

can go for a hike with.

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You can, you know, go swimming

with, you can do all this stuff

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with, , like a large breed dog

will produce up to two and a half.

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Tons of carbon dioxide a year,

, which is the equivalent of, your

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average family car for the year.

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So I try not to drive, , as much as I can.

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I go everywhere by bike and, and anyone

who knows me knows that about me.

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but I have two large breed dogs, right.

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So,

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So that's sort of the bad news,

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Andy: Okay.

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Yeah.

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This is not good for veterinarians.

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Like, none of this is

good for, for the vet

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Matthew: And, and, when we flip

it around and we go, right?

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So climate change and environmental

degradation, , also lead to , poor health

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outcomes for humans and animals, right?

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I mean, just look at something like

COVID, or, natural disasters and all

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this stuff like it's bad news, right?

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The good news is that there are.

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Are a lot of things that we can

do as pet owners, as veterinary

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professionals, as practice owners,

and just as citizens, , to reduce the

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impact that we have on the environment.

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and so that's a lot of what we're

trying to do in the Veterinary

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Sustainability Alliance is getting

people thinking about that.

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. There are lots of studies showing that

clients actually wanna see veterinarians

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taking a leading role in these sorts

of discussions, and they're actually

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willing to pay a premium for it.

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so, you know, if you wanna make a

business, you can make a business case

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for being environmentally sustainable.

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Andy: I think it's helpful to be able

to make a business case for it, right?

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It, it's, it's, in the world that we

live in now, , and we've had a, you know,

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a growing number of sort of corporate

practices and things, I think that

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there's a lot of people who would like

to have a, you know, a smaller footprint.

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I think you've gotta be able to

make a business case for that in

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order to get groups, , often to come

along and support what you're doing.

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Or at least make a case That this can

be a net neutral, , undertaking that

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it's not gonna be overall expense.

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I hate that it's that way, but I'm just

sort of trying to think about people

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being able to sort of get practices and

get practice groups kind of on board with

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being more environmentally conscious to

help me get a a, an idea of scale here.

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So we're talking about, we're

talking about meat consumption,

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we're talking about, The

environmental impact of having pets.

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What are the things that we

do at the practice that have a

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significant environmental impact?

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And then if I, if I work hard

with my practice to have a green

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practice, Matthew, am I, am I

actually making a difference or

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just kind of spitting in the wind?

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When we look at the larger picture of what

it means to have pet owners, I, I think,

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yeah, that, that's what I would wanna

know is like of the things that are in my

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control and in the way that I practice.

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Is there a significant

environmental impact there?

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Do I have the ability in the way

that I practice to, to actually

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make an impact that means anything?

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Matthew: Yeah.

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Great.

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Great question.

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I think, I think we do, short

answer is yes, I think we do.

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, and there's sort of many

different things that we can do.

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I think, you know, one of the things

is, the things that we can do within

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our practice, and then we can, talk

about it with, we can talk about

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it with staff, we can talk about it

with other veterinarians and get them

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thinking about what they're doing.

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you know, you mentioned corporate,

the big corporations are actually all.

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Interested in sustainability,

and they're all looking at how

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they can lessen their impact.

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And so I think that, there's a

snowballing effect for what we

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do, , that has the possibility

of, making a real difference.

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there's a lot of things

that we can do, right?

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I am gonna sort of jump ahead a bit

here, but one of my pet things that

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I love to talk about is, , lighting

choices in a clinic, right?

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I bought my practice, 20 years ago.

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, it had been running for 35 years.

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It had a whole bunch of compact,

, it had fluorescent tubes.

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In the ceiling.

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That's what it, its lighting was.

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occasionally when one had died out, I'd

gone and bought an LED tube and put it in

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and didn't really think too much of it.

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, and then I learned about a program that

we have in Ontario, , where you can call

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a number, , and they will send someone

around to assess The lighting you've

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got and how you could switch it over

to LEDs and there's a big government

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rebate that covers about half the work.

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So I said, sure.

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They took away all of the

old tubes and left us with.

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LEDs and I tracked it for two years

before I did that switch, and two

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years after I did that switch.

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And just going from fluorescent lights to

LEDs reduced my energy use by 28% a year.

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, Andy: was that kind of the

first major sort of, , pro

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environmental sustainability move

that you made in your practice?

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what sent you down this path?

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Matthew: so yes, that's

the biggest one we've done.

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We've done small scale changes.

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We've done big scale changes.

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everything from making sure that

we're, we've got a water filter rather

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than giving bottled water to clients.

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We've got a coffee machine that uses

whole beans rather than Keurig pods.

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We reuse, reusable, but rags for the

cleaning, except for sort of the sies of.

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Dirty stuff, we're using, , IV

bags that don't have PVC in them

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so that they can be recycled.

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, there are a lot of choices that we

can be making, , that don't cost

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a lot more than what we're already

doing, , and actually are nicer for the

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nicer to use and nicer for the world.

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Andy: Say I was a locum vet, right?

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I'm gonna, I'm gonna be a relief vet.

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I'm gonna come in for the day.

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, what would I see as I kind of came

into the clinic what would I notice

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Matthew: you wouldn't notice a lot, , to

be honest,, but you would notice things

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like, instead of there being, , paper

towel easily accessible everywhere.

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In each exam room, there's

a drawer that has a stack of

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reusable rags that we can use.

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, and so things like that, , in the kitchen

there's, reusable cutlery, plates, dishes,

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, I think the big thing that they would

notice is that there's usually anywhere

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between one and three bicycles parked in

the lobby we're right in downtown Toronto

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and, , we have tried to get the city to

put in bike racks in front of the clinic

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so that we can leave our bikes outside.

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but , I have, between one and

five, , employees who rides

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their bike to work, , every day.

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, we're using recyclable.

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Nitrile gloves, for example.

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, which is a huge thing.

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, we're being mindful of our

anesthetic protocols, so we're

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using less inhaled anesthetic gases.

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Things that just sort of changes that

we're making, , that we, you know, if

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we have a TV behind, , reception that

does occasionally pop up little, Hey,

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did you know that we're doing this?

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Did you know we're doing that?

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but most of the time,

unless you were looking.

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I don't think you'd be particularly

aware that you know it.

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It's not like we're a bunch of hippie

granola crunchers who are, you know,

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reusing needles and things like that.

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Andy: Yeah, so, so that's where, that's

where the hippie granola country line is.

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Is, is that reusing?

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It is.

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Okay, I got that.

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.

So you, you bought this practice, right?

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It wasn't always this way, and then when

you bought it, my perception is that

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you did not jump in and just spin the

searing wheel of we're gonna add in all

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of these protocols and things like that.

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Did you have a problem

with the team buy-in?

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Were there people who were just

like, who kinda rolled their

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eyes or who didn't perceive that

they liked their paper towels?

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tell, tell me about that do you

hire a certain type of person?

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I mean, I'm imagining there are some

people who would be really attracted

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to what you're doing and maybe some

people who would say, yeah, I don't,

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this isn't the way I'm used to doing

things, or, I don't share this values.

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Talk, talk to me about,

cultural fit with your staff.

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Matthew: =You raise a good point.,

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I bought half of the

practice 20 years ago.

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I bought the other half.

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. Five years ago, four years ago.

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So that was really when

things started to change.

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But before then, we'd done some things.

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It was not me, it was a staff member

who's suggest the reusable towels.

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Right.

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My parents had a place out in

the country that they sold and

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they had a bunch of extra dishes.

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So I brought in a bunch of reusable

dishes that we could use and just said,

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this is how we're doing things now in,

in terms of that, , the lighting was.

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was a big one, but that was, the advantage

of being the owner and the one who cares.

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The most about this is that there are

decisions like that, that you just say,

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like, this is what we're doing, right?

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It actually made for better

quality of light for everyone.

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So I think everyone's, happy with that.

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there are some things that, you

know, that, that do get some grumble.

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as I said, I got a, a coffee

machine that makes like individual

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coffees from whole beans.

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And thought, oh, isn't this great?

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We're gonna get rid of the Keurig.

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And, forgot that not everyone likes

really strong, really dark coffee.

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Andy: They were like, no,

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I, I missed the light roast.

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Yeah.

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Matthew: so my staff were like,

oh no, I don't like your coffee.

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, I don't wanna get rid of the Keurig.

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So we now actually you have the choice.

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The concession I made to the

Keurigs was that we would

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get, , a box from TerraCycle.

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So there's a company called

TerraCycle, which their whole

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thing is they will recycle things

that generally aren't recyclable.

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, so there's less impact on that even

if people are choosing to drink.

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Arguably less good

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Andy: Yeah.

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I mean, to me, I, I do, I do

love a heavy, dark roast coffee.

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Alright.

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So, you know, so I'm thinking about

this and I'm thinking about the examples

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that, that you're sort of putting down

and I think about all the different

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kinds of practices there are out there.

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There's just the different styles of

practice, like I said, um, you know,

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you've got mixed animal practices, small

animal, mobile practice, things like that.

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I, I know when you guys were doing work

, with the Green Cross certification, that

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you, you sort of took those types of.

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Variability between practices into play.

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Tell me a little bit about the Green

Paw certification and then also it's

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adaptability because some people

are going, yeah, this is not, this

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doesn't sound like my practice.

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, some of these things aren't gonna

work for us and help me, help

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Matthew: we we're out in the country.

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We're not gonna have people

riding their bikes to work.

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Andy: right.

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It's there, there, there you go.

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Right.

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Matthew: yeah.

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Our goal was to make the Green Paw

Certification program applicable to be

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evidence-based and make it applicable

to all, , practices in North America.

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, and so there are, , to get green

PA certification, , there are 10

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steps you need to do, are sort of

divided up into three different

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categories, which are core.

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Clinic and community.

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, and so the core is sort of the

foundational steps that if you want to be.

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Doing sustainability work, you really

need to sort of lay the groundwork, right?

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So those are, , the three steps

in core are, , forming a green

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team, which is sort of the number

one thing that everyone should do.

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And I, and, I did not do it 'cause I

was not aware that this was how things

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were done when I started down my

pathway of environmental sustainability.

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, so forming a green team, you're

bringing together, , different people

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with different lived experiences

from different areas of the clinic

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so that, , it's not just the practice

owner going, okay, here's what

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we're gonna do, that's sustainable.

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We're gonna, you know,

not use any paper at all.

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Then the technicians are like,

well, we really like using paper

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to record our anesthetic protocols.

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And reception says, well, we

have forms we need to sign.

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Right?

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So you need to get people from

different teams together so that you

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know that what you're gonna propose is

applicable to everyone at the clinic.

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Right.

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And then people are bringing

their own li lived experiences.

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So you need, and you need a team

because there are certain things that

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you just, you know, yes, I can say I'm

going to replace all of the lights.

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With LEDs.

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If I'm proposing something that, that's

sort of a bigger project, you know,

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or I am doing something that's gonna

require buy-in from other people, , I

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need to make sure that there's

enough people that are on board with

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it that we can sort of,, encourage

everyone to go along with that change.

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So that's sort of, that's the first

thing is forming your green team.

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, and then this next step is

assessing what your impact is.

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Before you do anything, right?

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So you need to know if you're gonna go

ahead and you're gonna make change and

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you're gonna say, Hey, look at all these

great things we did to reduce our impact.

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Well, how do you know how much

you've reduced your impact by?

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If you don't know what

your impact is, right.

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So for, for the American

Veterinary Clinics, the Veterinary

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Sustainability Alliance has a carbon

calculator, , that can help you,

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, calculate your carbon footprint.

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There are a number of very regionally

specific things in a carbon

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calculator, so it, unfortunately,

it isn't applicable to Canada.

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we are working on adapting it , for

the Canadian clinics as well.

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But, , so you need to sort of see

what your impact is, what you're

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measuring, so you know, what, what

impact your initiatives are having.

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and then the third part of core is

what are the, like what are the top

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five things you want to do, right?

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So come up with the five

things that you're going to do.

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So that sort of core, , and then

clinic is actually going and doing

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those five things that you said

you wanted in the core step.

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and those can be big things

or small things, right?

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So it can be changing your LEDs.

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It could be saying we're gonna install,

, an EV charger so that when clients

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come, they can plug in their ev and,

and charge up, or we're gonna have bike

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racks, or we're going to, it doesn't

matter what it is, it's just, it's five

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environmentally minded activities that

are important to the people at the clinic.

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Right.

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And, , I'm a huge fan of,

just getting people starting.

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, I am a 12 month a year bike

commuter in, in Toronto.

398

, and people look at me like

I'm crazy and, you could make

399

that argument, but it didn't.

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I didn't go from like driving

every day to being a 12 month

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of the year bike commuter.

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You know, I drove to work and then, and

it was a beautiful day and I signed up

403

for a charity bike ride , for the Farley

Foundation, which is a veterinary charity.

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and I needed to get in shape, so I would

start riding my bike on nice days, right.

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And then it was, you know, and it just

sort of built from there and it was like,

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Hey, I, I'm happier on the days that I.

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Right into work.

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So how can I extend it?

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So, so really those five steps , in

the, , green Pause certification are

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all about starting, getting things

going, getting people talking.

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And then the last two steps

are sharing information, right?

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Community is about, about sharing

this information with your staff, with

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your clients, and with your colleagues

to try to change people's behaviors,

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Andy: Yeah, that's, that's fantastic.

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Matthew: And so it's 10 steps and

it's relatively easy, 10 steps to do.

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We thought it was better to

have a, an easy program to get

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people sort of starting to think

about this rather than having it

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be, , something that was difficult

and that only a few, small handful

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of clinics would, would get behind.

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Andy: Well, Matthew, where

can people learn more about

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the Green PAW certification?

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, Matthew: the Veterinary Sustainability

Alliances website is, , veterinary

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sustainability alliance.org.

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, and on the website there are a

number of really good resources.

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So there you, there's the, , green

PO certification program with all

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of the forms you need to fill out.

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. To, , get the certification on there.

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There's also a blog where the

directors have written various

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articles that it's updated, , as much

as we have time to write articles

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about sustainability, , initiatives.

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So there's lots of good information there.

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, and then the, the Veterinary

Sustainability Alliance in conjunction

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with the A BMA and the CVMA put together

some videos, , on sort of those steps

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of core clinic and community, , that

are really great resources as well.

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There's, so there's, so there's

several videos on the website as

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well, , that people can look at.

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Andy: Outstanding.

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Well, I'll link that stuff up.

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, Matthew, I'll put a link to your

LinkedIn, , page there as well in case

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Matthew: That'd be

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Andy: follow up with you and,

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Matthew: Yeah, I, I

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Andy: eye on you.

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Matthew: I could talk about this stuff

for hours, so if anyone has any questions,

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they should feel free to reach out to me.

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If I can't answer it, I might put you in,

in touch with one of the other directors.

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, we've got a lot of

passion, , in the group, so

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Andy: Well, thanks for being here guys.

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Thanks for tuning in and listening.

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Everybody take care of yourselves, gang.

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Matthew: thanks a lot, Andy.

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Andy: And that's what I got for you guys.

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I hope you enjoyed it.

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Thanks to Matthew for being here.

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Thanks to you, , for checking this out.

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Guys.

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I hope that some of you'll go

take a look at the Green PAW

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certification and think about how

it might work in your vet clinics.

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I love the idea that there's things

that we can do to be a little bit

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better for the environment, a little

bit better for our patients, a little

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bit better for our communities.

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And I, I think that that's true.

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And so anyway, this is a, I I

thought it was an optimistic episode.

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I really enjoy talking to Matthew.

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Uh, it makes me think that there,

there's a lot of stuff that we can

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do that actually makes a difference

and that, , that's always lovely.

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Anyway, guys, take care of yourselves.

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I'll talk to you later on.

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Happy Earth Day everybody.

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Bye.