Reducing CO2 emissions, therefore, is top of the international agenda, but this is no mean feat. Not only will it take time, but also a huge shift in social, cultural and political attitudes, as well as behaviours. So, what of the short-term, asks Richard Hands, chairman of the Alliance for Beverage Cartons and the Environment (Ace) UK.
The UK’s Institute of Mechanical Engineers says that in conjunction with efforts to reduce carbon emissions, we should take measures to remove existing CO2 from the atmosphere, providing extra time to de-carbonise the global economy. They point to geo-engineering technologies, such as artificial trees, which remove CO2 for storage underground.
While geo-engineering has merit, natural carbon sinks such as the ever-growing Scandinavian forests used to make European beverage cartons already offer a practical and sustainable solution. In fact, recent research from the University of Helsinki, Finland, has found a strong link between the increasing demand for European forest timber and increased carbon capture (or sequestration), helping to combat climate change.
As most schoolchildren know, trees, with their ability to convert CO2 into oxygen through photosynthesis, are good for the environment. Remarkably, while the overall area of forest in Finland has remained largely unchanged between 1912 and 2005, the forests have increased in value in the fight against climate change due to increases in the average tree size and stocking density.
This unintended co-benefit of managed forestry, motivated by the commercial need to increase timber yields, has led to an increased biomass stock in Finnish forests sequestering 18 tonnes of CO2 annually per square kilometre, vs CO2 emissions in the same region of 12 tonnes per square kilometre.
On a European scale, it’s estimated that from 1990 to 2005, expanding forest biomass in the EU27 sequestered 360–495m tonnes of CO2 each year – 8-10% of EU fossil fuel carbon dioxide emissions.
So, although there has been a greater demand for wood-based products in recent years thanks to improved forest management practices, these forests produce a greater yield of wood per hectare and thus increasingly absorb CO2 from the atmosphere. This carbon is then retained within the tree and its future wood pulp products, such as the milk and beverage carton, for the whole life of the product.
Furthermore, because in managed forests trees are replaced or replenished at a rate equivalent or greater than their use, wood fibre is a renewable resource that can be used by industry with low environmental impact.
Member companies from the Alliance for Beverage Cartons and the Environment (ACE) UK – Elopak, SIG Combibloc and Tetra Pak – are committed to ensuring that the wood fibre for the paperboard in their cartons is sourced from forests that are responsibly managed.
Within Europe, 100% of the wood used in the paperboard used by these companies to make the cartons comes from paper mills that have a Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) chain-of-custody certification in place.
In addition to helping reduce CO2 when they’re living, the trees used in paperboard production process provide their own renewable energy after they’ve been harvested, helping to minimise the European carton industry’s net emissions of CO2.
The bark, sawdust and other by-products, such as black liquor resulting from the logging and pulp-making process, are used for bioenergy production. This renewable energy accounts for over 70% of the total energy needs of the four European paper mills producing paperboard for beverage cartons.
So, by using more wood for packaging and other industrial applications, not only will we be taking a huge step towards increasing the world’s forest biomass and thus the ability to remove CO2 from the atmosphere, but also to reducing our reliance on fossil fuels.
Richard Hands is chairman of the Alliance for Beverage Cartons and the Environment.
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