We all play a part in taking care of our planet. At FLS, this is expressed in our Health, Safety and Environment Policy. It is our commitment to minimise our environmental impacts, including those related to climate change.
Being environmentally friendly means complying with legal and other obligations. But it also means going beyond that by preventing pollution and utilising resources in a sustainable manner. We want our planet to continue being a welcome home to future generations.
We optimise the usage of our resources, like water and electricity, which benefits the environment, our customers and our bottom line. Monitoring and reducing our internal impacts are a central part of our culture and day-to-day work.
With our global presence, we have different environmental challenges and legislations in every country. We apply a common global management process to comply with standards and ensure environmental certification (ISO 14001). Using common multi-site certification, we can ensure consistency in audit reporting and process alignment. It enables improving our environmental performance at Group level, for example, by horizontal deployment of any non-conformity. We share our learnings and best practices across our locations.
We manage what we measure. That’s why our commitment to the Science Based Targets initiative to achieve Net Zero scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions by 2050 is ratified and translated into short-term actions and long-term plans. Our Sustainability Performance Indicators (SPI) system enables us to monitor and analyse all our environmental data while maximising transparency.
Furthermore, we have well-established procedures for reporting waste, water, scope 1 and scope 2 data in accordance with international guidelines and standards. In our global reporting system, we manage and monitor all environmental data concerning fuels, electricity, water, waste and disposal means. We also report on environmental incidents such as fuel or chemical spills.
Through our reductions programmes for emissions and water and waste, we aim to reduce our environmental footprint from our operations. These programmes have been established to encourage all our sites to develop and implement reduction initiatives, such as improving energy efficiency, reducing freshwater consumption and improving waste recycling.
As part of our efforts to increase the use of renewable energy in our own operations, solar panels have been installed at our manufacturing facility in Qingdao, China. Most of the site’s CO2 emissions are generated by the use of grid electricity, so the decision was made to begin the shift to solar panels. Permission was granted by the local authorities in 2021 and the 1.4 MW solar power system was installed and commissioned in 2022. The installation is expected to generate 1.6 million kWh of electricity annually, covering 42% of the site’s electricity consumption, and to reduce CO2 emissions by 691 tonnes annually – approximately 32%.