Water and energy use, transport, wood pulp for tissue materials, packaging optimization, land-fill reductions and updated emissions on greenhouse gas feature in the 75 page full report, which can be downloaded here.
The publishing of the report comes just days after P&G vice president of global product stewardship and sustainability, Len Sauers attended the COP21 discussions in Paris.
What can corporations do to cut greenhouse emissions?
A big part of the Paris discussions have been focused on what corporations can do to develop sustainable business growth while also protecting the environment and lowering CO2 emissions.
Speaking at the sidelines of the event in an interview with Climate Group, Sauers stated his belief that by addressing issues such as water scarcity and waste and emissions, businesses such as P&G “can play a significant role to help address these issues.”
In line with this vision, P&G’s most ambitious goal as part of its sustainability ambitions is to reduce greenhouse gas emission by 30% by 2020, as part of on-going plans that were introduced in 2010.
The report highlights how new partnerships with Constellation Energy and EDF RE that will help drive this ambition to cut greenhouse emissions, as well as the responsible sourcing of wood fiber and palm oil.
P&G had some catching up to do
Although P&G’s increased efforts on sustainability have been acknowledged by industry observers and environmental groups, in the past it has come under criticism, both for its lack of action on cutting greenhouse gas emissions, as well as its lack of drive to source sustainable palm oil.
In line with this, the report reinforces the fact that the company aims to power all of its plants with renewable energy, as well as using 100% renewable materials for all products and packaging, in turn helping to contribute to zero consumer and manufacturing waste going to landfill.
Here is a selection of the highlights from P&G's 2015 Sustainability Report:
- Climate:
- New Goal; updated our goal to reduce absolute greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2020. Since 2010, P&G has reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 4%.
- Transportation; met our goal of delivering a 20% reduction in truck kilometers per unit of production achieving a nearly 25% reduction since 2010. In addition, within North America, The Company has met our commitment to convert more than 20% of our truckloads to natural gas vehicles by 2016. This represents more than 14 million truck miles using cleaner burning natural gas while at the same time delivering several millions in cost savings.
- Wood Pulp; met our fiber sourcing goal to have 100% third-party certified virgin fiber in our tissue towel and absorbent hygiene products.
- Water: exceeded water reduction goal for manufacturing by delivering a 21% reduction since 2010.
- Waste:
- Zero Manufacturing Waste to Landfill; over the past three years, P&G has increased the number of zero manufacturing waste to landfill sites from 10% to nearly 50% of its manufacturing sites globally.
- Packaging; continued our efforts on packaging optimization such as moving Pampers from boxes to bags in most parts of Western Europe. This initiative resulted in more than an 80% reduction in packaging material weight per diaper saving more than 6000 tones of packaging material or the weight of approximately 4000 mid-size cars.