How PKV becomes climate neutral
PKV aims to reduce its CO2 emissions by 42% by 2031 and produce completely climate-neutral paper and cardboard from waste paper by 2045 – in the perfect sustainable cycle for packaging material. Recycling becomes greencycling. PKV is investing a three-digit million sum to achieve this goal.
PKV plans to reduce 42% of its CO2 emissions by 2031 (Scope 1 and 2*, compared to 2021) and to become net greenhouse gas neutral by 2045, as stipulated in the German Federal Climate Protection Act. The company is thus following the Paris Climate Agreement towards limiting the increase in the global average temperature to 1.5 degrees Celsius. The PKV will also have this plan confirmed by the globally recognized Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi).
“The path to climate neutrality is prescribed by law, the CO2 price leaves hardly any other economic options and ethically we see it as our responsibility to contribute to sustainable development. We have to go down this path. But this is also a great opportunity for energy-intensive companies like PKV,” says PKV shareholder Kristian Evers. “We have been using waste paper as a raw material since 1950. Recycling and sustainability are an elementary part of our corporate identity. If we can economically manufacture CO2-free products from waste paper, we have the perfect ecological cycle for packaging! It is worth making an effort to achieve this goal, even though it also involves major economic challenges.”
In order to replace natural gas, the energy source used to date, PKV will rely on a mix of different energy sources and efficiency measures. Green electricity will make up a large part of the future energy mix – for this, however, PKV will need a new, larger electricity connection – and new plants that use the energy from the electricity to produce the required process heat on the factory premises.
There are also plans to substantially reduce the specific energy consumption per tonne – in other words, to make massive energy savings. Large industrial heat pumps, the use of which is currently being tested in initial concept studies, could make a significant contribution to this.
In addition, PKV wants to use energy from waste. Waste paper that cannot be processed into paper or cardboard arrives at the plant every day. Even today, this waste – some of which consists of CO2-neutral biomass – is carefully sorted out, processed into a fuel and burned elsewhere, for example in combined heat and power plants, to generate energy. In future, PKV intends to use this energy itself in a new waste-to-energy power plant on its site.
Even more detailed information on PKV’s decarbonization pathway is available (in German) on the website www.pkvarel.de/dekarb.
Complex analyses and approval procedures are required for all of these projects, and PKV will provide separate public information on these. In total, the company will invest a three-digit million amount in this goal by the time it achieves climate neutrality, thus ensuring PKV’s well-known decades-long stability and competitiveness for decades to come.
*Scope 1: Direct emissions | Scope 2: Indirect emissions from purchased energy