For us, sustainability is not just a fancy word. We breathe life into this term, because we view all our actions in terms of preserving resources and the environment.
Environmental sustainability at WALTHER Faltsysteme
Environmental sustainability
Act environmentally friendly
Green business
Sustainability is firmly anchored in our corporate mindset and applies to all our processes. One example is the modern building with in-house solar technology we work in, allowing us to save considerable amounts of greenhouse gases since 2013. Electricity that we cannot produce ourselves, we obtain from green sources - locally and from the region. Our reusable load carriers are produced on state-of-the-art, energy-efficient injection moulding machines.
We have taken a further step by changing the vehicle fleet for our employees to hybrid or all-electric vehicles. These can easily be charged with green WALTHER electricity at our own charging stations.
High reusable quality instead of single-use products
The manufacturing process of our plastic load carriers requires a lot of energy. As they are very robust and reusable, they are nevertheless very sustainable. We process high-quality and durable material. This means that our products are in use for up to 100 rotations and make a lot of single-use packaging unnecessary.
This is precisely the CO2e advantage of reusable products: Each additional use of reusable load carriers avoids the necessary raw material and energy consumption in the production of disposable packaging as well as the CO2e emissions that are generated during the related transport and disposal or recycling.
The eco-balance of our products improves with each additional circulation compared to the disposable alternatives. Overall, WALTHER products therefore perform significantly better when used properly, even if the ecological footprint appears larger at first due to the energy required for production.
Resources conservation starts with product design
We focus on the responsible use of resources right from the design stage of our products. We pay attention to a robust design for a long service life, the repairability of individual components and easy recycling. Thanks to the high volume reducibility of our containers of up to 80%, our customers save even more resources when returning the empty boxes. Due to their high quality, our load carriers can be in circulation for up to 20 years, meaning that a lot of disposable packaging can be avoided.
Repair Capability
Depending on the type of load carrier, certain parts are exposed to particularly high loads during daily operation, so that damage cannot be prevented after long and intensive use. Thanks to the modular design of our load carriers, it is possible to replace components individually. After replacing the damaged components, the load carrier is ready again for use for many further cycles before a new investment becomes necessary after a long service life. The repair capability ensures not only lower resource consumption, but also savings in procurement costs.
Recycling
We recycle on a grand scale in our injection moulding production: We also rely on recycling within production – we recycle start-up parts or those out of tolerance. In production, we use recycled material, i.e. reprocessed plastics from household or commercial waste, whenever possible, for example from the "Yellow Bag", the German recycling bag. We take back all damaged and broken containers and turn the discarded products into reclaimed material, which we then use, for example, to produce new boxes for our GREENLINE series.
Our corporate carbon footprint
Climate neutrality is one of the issues of the future that drives us and motivates us to become even better and to push even further. For the first time, we have carried out a carbon footprint assessment for the entire WALTHER Faltbox Group to identify our environmental impact and develop optimisation measures.
For 2023, we have calculated a corporate carbon footprint of 2,553.75 t CO2e. This includes Scope I (149.26 t CO2e) and Scope II (2,404.49 t CO2e).
The manufacture of plastic products is a highly energy-intensive process. Therefore, we are constantly working on making our company processes as energy efficient as possible and thereby reducing our emissions. The calculated footprint is supposed to serve us as a basis for evaluating the following years - for the protection of our environment.
Ecolabel "Blauer Engel"
The "Blauer Engel” or “Blue Angel" is the ecolabel of the Federal Ministry for the Environment and identifies particularly sustainable products. We received our first ecolabel back in 1985. While at the time the aim was primarily to avoid waste, the focus today is on holistic climate protection with the help of environmentally friendly products and services.
By now, every folding box from WALTHER and our Düsseldorf plastic pallet have been awarded the "Blue Angel" - their reusability is the reason why. Because our reusable plastic boxes not only avoid any packaging waste during use, they are also in circulation for decades and are then recycled and re-manufactured into new containers again.
Foundation "Stiftung Initiative Mehrweg"
The aim of the "Stiftung Initiative Mehrweg" (SIM) is to conserve resources and encourage environmental protection. It wants to create the necessary conditions to sustainably stabilise and increase the proportion of reusable packaging in all economic sectors - and thus avoid waste. With our many years of expertise as a manufacturer of reusable load carriers made of plastic, we have been supporting the SIM as a member since mid-2021.
Every year, the SIM focuses on individual topics and advocates for the promotion of reusable systems in the environmental policy dialogue. Dominik Lemken, Managing Director of WALTHER Faltsysteme, is an honorary board member of the foundation and helps to promote reusable systems.
The pro-K "Zero Pellet Loss" initiative
The aim of the initiative "Zero Pellet Loss" of the German industry association for semi-finished products and consumer products made of plastic, pro-K, is to prevent the loss of plastic pellets along the entire supply chain and to reduce waste in the world's oceans. While only a small part of the plastic waste in the world's oceans consists of pellets, they are also found in rivers, on beaches and in the sea.
We at WALTHER Faltsysteme are also participating in the initiative in order to minimise the waste of raw materials and at the same time the environmental impact of spilled pellets and colour batch.
By signing the initiative, we committed ourselves to three things:
- Providing the necessary technical and organisational conditions to prevent spillage of pellets and to ensure that once spilled, pellets do not end up in the environment.
- Training employees to avoid and, if necessary, effectively clean up spilled plastic pellets.
- Regularly reviewing the effectiveness of the measures.
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