Herma’s recycling offset around 457 metric tons of CO2 emissions in 2016, while the company’s fleet generated CO2 emissions just under 400 metric tons
German self-adhesive company, Herma, saved nearly 457 metric tons of CO2 last year by recycling discarded siliconised release liner, making its vehicle fleet effectively carbon-neutral for the sixth year in succession.
Approximately 360,000 metric tons of siliconised release paper is generated every year throughout Europe, the bulk of which comes from within companies applying labels.
Since 2010 Herma, based in Filderstadt, Germany, has been supplying discarded release liner from production to the recycling company Cycle4Green (the liner would otherwise have to be disposed of – at a cost). With the help of Cycle4Green and Austrian paper manufacturer, Lenzing, the waste is turned into label paper or new release liner, both of which are reused by Herma.
In 2016, this process avoided around 457 metric tons of CO2 emissions that would have been generated by Herma manufacturing products made from virgin fibres.
‘We generate relatively little release liner as waste material because it is part of the adhesive material that we produce,’ stated Dr. Thomas Baumgärtner, Herma’s managing director and head of the self-adhesive materials division. ‘We come pretty close to the “cradle to cradle principle,” in other words a more or less closed material cycle,’ he added.
Herma plans to continue to support Cycle4Green’s system in the future and also hopes to encourage as many of its customers as possible to participate in the recycling initiative.
