Holmen is ‘only’ Swedish firm to join 2012 Carbon Performance Leadership Index
The Holmen Group, which includes Iggesund Paperboard, has claimed that it is the only Swedish company to have been selected to join the Carbon Performance Leadership Index.
The index is compiled by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), an independent, not-for-profit organisation which holds the largest collection globally of self-reported climate change data, and which is working to drive greenhouse gas emissions reduction.
CDP represents 655 institutional investors with $78 trillion in assets. According to Holmen, it is the only Swedish company to make the list this year.
Each year CDP asks companies around the world to report on their emissions, their goals for reducing them, and their assessment of a range of risks and opportunities related to climate change. The companies are then ranked on to their climate change transparency, with the best disclosers joining CDP’s Carbon Disclosure Leadership Index (CDLI).
This year’s evaluation gave Holmen high marks for its climate strategy and for how it reports its climate-related data. As a result, Holmen is now included in the CDLI. In addition, Holmen is the only Swedish company also to be included in the Carbon Performance Leadership Index, according to the firm.
Environmental and social issues
The aim of this index is to make it easier for investors to identify companies which work in a responsible and developmental way with economic, environmental and social issues.
“It’s a great honour to be included in this list,” said Lars Strömberg, director of sustainable and environmental affairs at Holmen. “This is the result of lengthy and patient efforts to reduce our fossil carbon dioxide emissions and also to make our work more and more transparent.”
As an example of Holmen’s work, Strömberg points to the large-scale emissions reductions which have already occurred and are planned at Holmen’s business unit Iggesund Paperboard. Over the past two years about €350m has been invested to minimise carbon dioxide emissions at Iggesund’s mills at Iggesund, Sweden and Workington, England.
“The Workington mill is particularly interesting because overnight we will switch our energy source from 100% fossil fuel to 100% biofuel,” said Strömberg. “And it’s especially noteworthy that such a huge step is being taken by a large industrial processing company.”
