Smurfit Kappa has demonstrated its commitment to delivering on its sustainability goals through the recent inauguration of two state-of-the-art investments in Spain.
Over 12,000 solar panels were unveiled at the packaging leader’s Sangüesa paper mill which will work alongside its biomass and recovery boilers to generate more than 50% of its annual energy requirements, the equivalent to powering 3,600 homes.
The photovoltaic system, which is the largest of its kind in the Navarra region, is set to reduce the mill’s annual CO2 emissions by over 3,000 tonnes and represents an investment of €6 million. Since 2005, the Sangüesa paper mill has reduced its CO2 emissions by more than 51%.
The second investment of €27 million in its Nervión paper mill will see the mill adopt a fully circular production process involving the biggest landfill reduction project Smurfit Kappa has undertaken to date. The project is set to remove 75,000 tonnes of waste from landfill, and additionally, eliminate approximately 450,000km per year in road transport.
Javier Rivas, COO of Smurfit Kappa Paper & Board Europe, said: “The recent inauguration of both the Sangüesa and the Nervión investments are milestones for the Smurfit Kappa paper division and aligned with the EU Green Deal’s transition to climate neutrality through increasing clean energy technologies.”
Garrett Quinn, Chief Sustainability Officer at Smurfit Kappa, added: “These two projects demonstrate the Group’s continued investment to deliver on its sustainability goals with over €30 million in these two projects alone, delivering reduced emissions, and increasing the circularity of our production process.”
