Climate change is the world’s most urgent environmental priority, the challenge we all have a duty to address. This is particularly true in Europe, where EU member states have committed to drastically cutting their greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and achieving carbon neutrality by 2050. Reducing our carbon impact will have consequences at every stage in the value chain: from the choice of raw materials to the shipping of finished goods, not to mention our industrial processes.

AN AMBITIOUS PLAN TO DECARBONIZE OUR ACTIVITIES

Our first carbon accounting exercise, assisted by Carbone 4, dates back to 2009. Ten years later, with the help of the same company of experts, we conducted another thorough review of our CO2 emissions with two objectives in mind: firstly, to observe the concrete impact of our first effort to reduce emissions - the carbon emitted per tonne of glass produced fell by 11% in the decade 2009 - 2019 — but also to support the creation of an even more ambitious decarbonization strategy for 2035 and 2050. It set out a roadmap a road map and objectives that received the SBTi (Science-Based Targets initiative) seal of approval this past November 2022.

Two major actions, upstream and downstream of the process, allow us to save natural resources and energy, while also facilitating recycling: our use of cullet, and our organic decorative materials. At the same time, we are always looking to explore new measures with the potential to optimize our use of resources.

WHAT RAW MATERIALS GO INTO OUR GLASS?

Traditionally, glass is made with sand, limestone and sodium carbonate. This mixture is melted down at extremely high temperatures. Since glass can be recycled indefinitely, we have already replaced a certain proportion of our raw ingredients with cullet, essentially glass shards from recycled sources. In 2022, Saverglass used 73.3% cullet in our colored glass.

THE ADVANTAGES OF CULLET

The primary benefit is obviously the fact that we are using recycled material rather than extracting more virgin raw materials from the earth. The second is of a technical nature: the fusion point of cullet is lower than that of our traditional mix of raw materials, enabling us to use less energy and thus to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. Saverglass endeavors to use as much cullet as possible, bearing in mind that the supply is dependent upon the rate of glass recycling -which still has room for improvement in Europe - and assignment criteria which vary from one country to the next. In France, for example, available cullet is distributed among glassmakers on a region-by-region basis. In Belgium, on the other hand, it goes to the highest bidder.

OUR ORGANIC DECORATIVE TECHNIQUES

A pioneer in this field since 2005, Saverglass’ Organic Color Play range allows us to decorate bottles using inks and varnishes made from organic ingredients. Not only does this process provide us with a very broad pallet of high-quality colors, it also has considerable health and environmental benefits compared with traditional printing methods. First and foremost, these organic decorative materials contain no heavy metals. They also allow for considerable energy savings, as they do not demand hightemperature baking at 650°C (like enamel): they simply require polymerization at the much lower temperature of 165°C. Last but not least, they ensure that the bottles remain 100% recyclable.

Our commitment to reducing CO2 emissions encompasses the whole of our value chain, including the Scope 3 emissions which account for 39% of our total carbon footprint. Our efforts on this front are focused primarily on raw materials, logistics and transport.

OPTIMIZING PACKAGING AND LOADING

Logistics (upstream and downstream logistics) accounted for 9% of our CO2 emissions in 2019. In order to reduce this impact we are working across multiple fronts, at the Group level and within each site: The sleeves in which we pack our bottles: we have already reduced their thickness (saving almost 200 tons of polyethylene per year) and they now contain 30% recycled materials (thanks to our plastic collection scheme). Shipping pallets: in France, Belgium and Mexico, pallets are picked up from our clients, sorted, repaired where necessary and reused. Pallet loading: on average, the number of bottles per pallet was up by 3% in 2022 (from 2019), which adds up to 27,000 fewer pallets, the equivalent of around 1,000 truck loads.

LOCAL SOLUTIONS FOR A GLOBAL OBJECTIVE

Solutions for reducing CO2 emissions may differ from one site to the next, in response to the nature of customer demands, expected environmental benefits and local constraints. For example, thermoformed packaging allows us to arrange the bottles in a staggered pattern, increasing the number of bottles per layer by an average of 7% while cutting the weight of packaging used per pallet in half. Nevertheless, this solution requires us to invest in special machinery and is only environmentally advantageous if we are able to retrieve and recycle the packaging, which is not easy with exported products. As a result, this solution is only used at our French facilities.

In Mexico, meanwhile, although our trucks can theoretically carry as many as 30 pallets, US regulations impose a maximum load of 19.6 tons for road haulage, equivalent to around 25 pallets of our heaviest bottles. Our Mexican team has found a way of optimizing the loading of each truck, mixing heavy and light products by cross-referencing key data (weight, quantity available, delivery date, urgent requests, etc.). In 2022, the average load carried by trucks was between 27 and 28 pallets, two to three times more than 2021, amounting to a saving of around 40 trucks each year.

Finally, since April 2022 our US office in Kentucky has been sending out samples in packaging which contains zero plastic and is thus easier to recycle: the sellotape has been replaced with paper adhesive which sticks when moist, the bubblewrap has made way for dimpled wrapping paper, and our decorated bottles are shrouded in crepe paper. In 2023, this new system was expanded to the US office in California.