In September last year, Paccor, a leading global player in the packaging industry, launched its sustainability strategy CARE (Circularity, Alliances, Resources, and Employees) with the overall goal of protecting the most precious ones and assets. As part of CARE, the company outlined a detailed plan to get to carbon neutrality starting with announcing a renewable electricity commitment in October 2020 and committed to providing updates on the progress. It has been working hard to turn its commitments into action and is now announcing further steps taken on the path to be carbon neutral by 2050.
In order to deliver on its commitment, Paccor has formulated a series of resource efficiency targets which have been operationalised across all business and will report on progress every year. Including:
10% reduction in energy consumption per ton of product by 2025.
100% renewable energy from over a three-year period starting from 2020.
25% reduction in waste per ton of product and zero waste to landfill by 2025.
100% closed water cycle in all production facilities by 2025.
‘While our goals on reducing carbon emissions and waste as well as energy and water use within CARE are challenging, they will enable us to continue making an important contribution to the sustainability challenges faced by our company, customers and broader society. During 2020 we have achieved significant milestones and we are proud to say that we are over-achieving in our commitment,’ outlined CEO Andreas Schuette.
In 2019, Paccor standardised the monitoring of the diverse energy, waste and water tracking systems and in 2020 the company identified and implemented strategic energy waste and water reduction projects across all sites, as part of the resource efficiency programme. Last year the expected energy efficiency improvement has been achieved and the overall renewable electricity share has been increased to 64%.
For 2021, the company has secured additional renewable electricity up to 86% of all electricity use with 12 out of 16 plants now running entirely on renewable electricity, by guarantees of origin for renewable energy in accordance with the EU Renewable Energy Directive and in compliance with the quality criteria of the latest Green House Gas (GHG) Protocol Scope 2 of application.
‘Furthermore, the renewable electricity we have purchased comes from power plants with high quality sustainability attributes such as the guarantee of re-investment in new renewable capacity and additional measures for preservation of biodiversity. In this way we are further contributing to the implementation of SDG 7, on access to affordable, reliable, and sustainable energy, and SDG 13, on urgent action to combat climate change,’ concluded Caterina Camerani, vice president group sustainability.