The packaging sector in Catalonia is committed to bioenergy

Submitted by Serena Rebollo… on 30 October 2020

"Companies in the packaging sector are starting their journey towards the biomass switch"

"Bioenergy promotes a renewable, local and economic energy consumption"

 

Bioenergy is constituted as an opportunity of great value in the packaging sector insofar as, to achieve the transformation of industrial activity towards sustainability and energy efficiency, thus leading climate action towards a circular model.

Many companies already have this renewable, local and cheap energy, which avoids the consumption of finite resources such as fossil fuels, and which helps the industrial decarbonisation of Catalonia. In this case, on the webinar of October 27 that the Bioenergia Catalunya Cluster and the Packaging Cluster co-organized, various examples of good practices were presented where they already incorporate bioenergy in their thermal processes to improve their industrial competitiveness.

In a first approach, Mr. Robert Roch, Coordinator of PEFC Catalonia, presented the work carried out by the association that certifies sustainable forest management in Catalonia. PEFC Catalonia strives to maintain the diversity of nature in a way that is compatible with economic development, generating 65% of the forest certifications worldwide.

In the conversion process, the PEFC certificate is one more tool of the packaging companies, which stretch the chain of custody with the demand for the certificate and offer consumers an endorsement that the corresponding indicators of sustainability.

Later, in the virtual session, four examples of practical cases were presented, such as the carbon-free company Pere Valls, S.A. Mr. Pere Joan Valls, CEO of Pere Valls, stated that since they had invested in this renewable energy, they have been able to see the results as a win-win relationship: on the one hand, they have eliminate the harmful emissions that they emitted and that damaged the environment, in addition to preventing forest fires; and, on the other hand, they save up to 35% in energy consumption.

Since 2014, the Pere Valls company has reduced 3,500 T of CO2 per year.

The Commercial Director of TERMOSUN, Mr. Xavier Piñero, added one more quality of bioenergy in his speech and that is that it allows the company's energy consumption to be planned annually thanks to price stability, which unlike energy such as gas natural gas, propane gas or other fuels, it does not fluctuate month to month.

As Xavier Piñero commented, it is necessary to revalue the elements and techniques necessary to obtain energy, with all kinds of by-products that can be burned, such as cocoa beans, olive pits, remains of corn, dried fruit shells or surplus wood.

Additionally, Mr. Daniel SoléCommercial Director of VYNCKE,  explained the case of Nestlé, a brand that uses the surplus by-product of its production, in this case coffee beans, and burns them in the boiler located in Girona, to transform it into biomass . An effective performance to reduce the carbon footprint, as part of the environmental sensitivity of Nestléa member company of the Packaging Cluster.

Biomass offers great versatility as it is nourished from inexhaustible sources, since there are many elements that need to be burned and then converted into bioenergy.

To finish, Mr. Alex San MiguelQUADPACK Sustainability Champion - also members of the Packaging Cluster -, demonstrated how local work can have a global impact by developing this type of initiative. Quadpack has managed to deal with its own carbon footprint, as part of the demand received from its customers and as a business vision for the future.

Alex San Miguel thus encourages promoting the dissemination of this type of energy with greater pedagogy of the options available in the market. For example, they use the surplus left over from the production of their wooden caps for cosmetic packaging to generate their own energy.

Many of the companies in the sector are setting up the “biomass switch”, and are beginning their journey by analyzing step by step how they can improve individually to make themselves available to society. Together we can make this world a more sustainable place.

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