Reckitt Benckiser Targets 20% Carbon Cut Across Product Lifecycle

Source: www.sustainablelifemedia.com

Reckitt Benckiser, a major manufacturer of cleaning and personal care products, has kicked off a new carbon-reduction effort that targets emissions not only from manufacturing operations but from raw materials and product use as well.

This "cradle to grave" approach measures the carbon impact of raw and packaging materials, manufacturing, logistics, and distribution, plus consumer use and disposal of products, which may have the greatest carbon impact.

The program, called Carbon 20, aims to reduce carbon emissions by 20% per unit by 2020. The company has outlined four key elements of the program:

1. Consumer communication and information programmes to allow consumers to reduce energy (and water) consumption in the home.
2. Cooperation with suppliers and trade customers to re-engineer how Reckitt Benckiser makes, packages, distributes and sells products to avoid and reduce energy use across the whole supply chain.
3. Redesign of products and packaging to use materials with lower volumes reducing ‘embedded energy’, allowing greater reduction and recycling of packaging, and reducing logistics and distribution requirements.
4. Internal programmes to avoid and reduce energy use in the company’s worldwide manufacturing and commercial operations.

"This different approach targets more than just the easy wins under our direct control like factory emissions or travel," says Bart Becht, CEO of Reckitt Benckiser. "It will require real partnership across our business and with our business partners to reduce energy consumption; and education and communication with consumers to enable them to tackle their own impact which can be the largest part, particularly where laundry or dishwashing machines are involved."

Reckitt Benckiser says it will work with external experts, including the Carbon Disclosure Project’s new supply chain initiative, to implement a carbon measurement system for the entire product lifecycle.