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Environment
Metsä Board’s Sustainability Service
Carbon number crunching – how big is your footprint? The term carbon footprint is probably familiar, but what does it really mean, and how can it be used to make more sustainable packaging choices?
Charlie Bass, illustration: Leo Tomaszewski
T he carbon footprint of a product or service refers to the total amount of greenhouse gases emitted during its life-cycle. Carbon footprint, or glob- al warming potential as it is more precisely termed, is one of the environmental impact categories that can be measured in a life cycle assessment. To calculate it cred- ibly, good-quality data from two different sources are essential: primary data from a company’s own systems and secondary data from external data sets and literature. “Primary data should cover all relevant activities and raw materials used in creating the product, and the secondary data need to be representative,” explains Lari Oksala , Sustainability Specialist at Metsä Board. “For example, when performing calculations for our paperboards, we follow industry-specific Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) standards and use data sets that are representative, such as sustainable forestry in the Nordic region where our wood raw material is grown.” But not all carbon footprints calculations are creat- ed equal. “When we’re talking about carbon footprint calculation, it’s really important to remember scope and methodology, because they can vary – meaning the re- sults of different calculations are not necessarily compa- rable,” says Oksala. “For example, the scope defines the parts of the value chain that are included, while the meth- odology describes how the various environmental impact categories are used. The sources need to be used consistently to ensure an accurate result.” “At Metsä Board, to calculate the carbon footprint of a package, we measure the weight of each material
used. Using data from our own paperboards and values from data sets for other materials, we then calculate the life-cycle impact of each material, combining them to make an overall result.” Supporting more sustainable packaging choices Accurate information about a paperboard’s carbon footprint helps Metsä Board’s customers develop packaging with a lower environmental impact and means they can be fully transparent when communicating with consumers. “Customers can use carbon footprint calculations when evaluating the whole life-cycle of a packaging material, helping them to make better decisions about which materials to use,” Oksala says. “A carbon footprint is something you cannot evaluate simply by looking at a package. Just like forest certifications such as PEFC or FSC®, it provides brand own- ers and consumers with additional information to help them make more sustainable choices,” explains Oksala. Life-cycle analysis calculations performed by Metsä Board have shown that swapping rigid PET plastic with MetsäBoard Prime FBB EB paperboard – for example, in a tomato box or cookie tray – can reduce the carbon foot- print of a package by as much as 80 percent. •
Metsä Board’s Sustainability Service helps customers reduce the environmental impact of their packaging by providing accurate information about the carbon footprint of its paperboard products.
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