P&G Makes Major Step Toward Better Sustainability

Apr 3rd, 2013

Abby Penning

Procter & Gamble announced 45 of its facilities have achieved zero manufacturing waste to landfill, which marks a major step towards the company’s long-term vision of sending zero manufacturing and consumer waste to landfills. During the past five years, P&G's work to find worth in waste has created over $1 billion in value for the company.

Bob McDonald, P&G president, CEO and chairman, said, “We have a vision for the future, where plants are powered by renewable energy, products are made from recycled, and renewable materials and resources are conserved, with no waste going to landfill. Changing the way we see waste as a company has brought us one step closer to this goal at 45 sites worldwide, where all of our manufacturing waste is recycled, repurposed or converted into energy.”

P&G announced its first zero manufacturing waste to landfill site in Budapest in 2007. Since then, the company has shared a long-term Environmental Vision, pledging to work toward zero consumer and manufacturing waste worldwide. Through quality assurance, packaging reduction, compaction and recycling efforts, the company now ensures that 99% of all materials entering P&G plants leaves as finished product or is recycled, reused or converted to energy.

To drive all sites toward zero, P&G has searched for innovative ways to find value in what was once seen as waste. In Mexico, paper sludge from a Charmin toilet tissue plant is turned into low-cost roof tiles used to build homes in the local community. At a U.S. Pampers site, scrap from the wipe manufacturing process is converted to upholstery filling. And, in the U.K., waste created in the production of Gillette shaving foam is composted then used to grow turf for commercial uses. Learn about these and other innovative reuse stories in the short video “Worth from Waste.”

“There are well-defined systems for recycling materials like paper, plastic and glass, but our product portfolio is incredibly broad, resulting in a diverse set of waste streams to find sustainable solutions for,” shared Dr. Forbes McDougall, who leads P&G’s global zero manufacturing waste program. “We focused on finding solutions for our toughest waste streams at our largest sites, and while initially we saw progress in our overall corporate recycling, the increase in zero landfill sites was slow. Today, we have found ways to divert most of our major waste streams away from landfill, so we’re now seeing new sites achieve zero manufacturing waste to landfill nearly every month.”

P&G zero manufacturing waste sites where beauty care and grooming products are produced include Taicang in China; Baddi and Bhiwadi in India; Shiga in Japan; Blois in France; Euskirchen, Kronberg, Rothenkirchen, Wallduern and Berlin in Germany; Nenagh in Ireland; Aleksandrow and Lodz in Poland; Urlati in Romania; Reading in the U.K.; Manaus in Brazil; and Andover, Boston and Hunt Valley in the U.S.