Korsnäs is one of the world’s largest producers of virgin fibre-based packaging material, primarily for consumer products. Production capacity amounts to 1.1 million tonnes of carton board and paper annually, and the production sites are in Sweden. Since April 2011 there are EPDs for liquid packaging board, cartonboard, white top kraftliners as well as sack and craft paper.
Korsnas displays the environmental impact and use of resources per tonne and per 1000 kilogramme for each of its packaging material. The company has also included potential environmental gain in its EPDs. One example is its climate programme.
Korsnäs invests in resource optimisation in order to reduce the need for fossil fuels.
All information that is declared in an EPD has to be verifiable. EPDs are no sustainability reports, however an EPD allows for companies to add anything of interest to the declaration.
Our EPDs complement our other product communication and the idea is for our customers to find answers to their environment-related questions”, says Per Haglund, former Director of Sales and Marketing of Paperboard at Korsnäs.
The fibre content in Korsnäs’ packaging material is based on 100% renewable fibres. Korsnäs’ operations have an impact on the environment through forestry management, use of resources like energy, chemicals, water and air, and emissions to water and air.
The international EPD system is based on a hierarchic approach on the following international standards: ISO 9001, Quality management system, ISO 14001, Environmental management systems, ISO 14044, LCA requirements and guidelines and ISO 14025, Type III environmental declarations.
”The most important thing for us is that our EPDs are developed in a standardised, transparent and well defined way. This is still quite rare in the environmental debate. So far it’s been difficult to compare the effect of different products on the environmental, and climate effects in particular”, says Per Haglund.
In order to develop its EPDs Korsnäs has divided its systems into three life cycle phases. Upstream includes forestry, production of fertilisers, production of energy wares, production of chemicals, auxiliary products and other raw materials, as well as production of transport packaging. Its core system includes transportation of all materials (including wood) to the core processes, production of pulp, production of paper and paperboard, cutting and packing of the products and treatment of waste generated from the production processes. The third phase, downstream, includes distribution of the product and waste management of transport packaging.
All three phases affect the climate, although Korsnäs’ suppliers have a particularly big impact during the upstream phase.
“We’ve worked hard to be able to offer our customers materials that are doing the job with less resources. This works out better from a climate as well as a financial perspective”, says Per Haglund.
The EPDs from Kornäs can be found here.