RESOURCE CONSERVATION & PAPER ASSESSMENT TOOLS
Paper-making is a resource-intensive manufacturing process and West Linn Paper is committed to managing resources wisely. We carefully monitor our use of water and energy to ensure that we're maximizing our efficiency - a practice that sustains not only our environment, but also our business.
Since our start-up, our primary focus has been on reducing water consumption and the waste material that we generated. We have been very successful - reducing our overall water consumption by nearly 20% and cutting our stock losses almost in half. We continue to look at new ways to conserve water and have added fuel and power to our list of projects to address the issues of rising fuel costs and concern over climate change.
In March 2006, the US Department of Energy visited the mill to perform a "Save Energy Now" assessment to work with mill employees to design a series of projects to reduce fuel consumption. Those projects, along with a few others implemented shortly before the assessment, have proved very successful - since the beginning of 2005, the amount of fuel required to manufacture a ton of paper has decreased by 17% and since early 2006, our power consumption has dropped by 5%.
In 2008 we'll be installing more air scouring systems in our filter beds to reduce both water and energy consumption. We'll be replacing the vacuum pumps on one of our paper machines with a newer, more energy efficient design. And we'll be focusing more of our efforts on greenhouse gas emissions - establishing a baseline to better understand our past habits and developing a plan to comply with anticipated reduction targets.
Below is a list of just some of the programs that West Linn Paper supports:
The Bonneville Environmental Foundation
Since 2002, West Linn Paper Company has been purchasing Renewable Energy
Certificates (RECs) from the Bonneville Environmental Foundation (BEF), a
non-profit foundation dedicated to the promotion, financing and development of
new sources of renewable energy, renewable energy education programs and
watershed restoration projects.
Each REC that West Linn Paper Company purchases from BEF represents one
megawatt-hour (MWh) of clean, renewable electricity generated and delivered to
the power grid. The RECs that the company purchases offset a portion of its
annual electricity use and will reduce the demand for conventional power from
fossil fuel power plants. In fact, West Linn Paper Company's purchases have
supported enough clean energy to power almost 2,000 homes for one year and have
kept over 12,000 metric tons of CO2 from entering the atmosphere.
For more information visit: www.b-e-f.org.
The Climate Registry
The Climate Registry is a nonprofit collaboration among North American states,
provinces, territories and Native Sovereign Nations that sets consistent and
transparent standards to calculate, verify and publicly report greenhouse gas (GHG)
emissions into a single registry. The Registry supports both voluntary and
mandatory reporting programs and provides comprehensive, accurate data to reduce
GHG emissions.
West Linn Paper Company achieved the environmental leadership status of Climate
Registered™ by successfully registering its comprehensive greenhouse gas (GHG)
emissions inventory according to the rigorous standards of The Climate Registry.
Participation in The Registry's voluntary program demonstrates West Linn Paper
Company’s pioneering role within the paper industry.
For more information visit:
www.theclimateregistry.org
EPA Green Power Partnership
In 2009, West Linn Paper Company joined the EPA's Green Power Partnership, a
voluntary program supporting the increased use of green power to reduce the
environmental impacts associated with conventional electricity use. Program
participants, like West Linn Paper Company, have voluntarily purchased billions
of kilowatt-hours of green power each year and include Fortune 500 companies,
businesses of every size, colleges and universities, as well as, local, state
and federal governments. Details can be found at:
www.epa.gov/greenpower
Environmental
Paper Assessment Tool (EPAT)
West Linn Paper Company is a participant in the EPAT, a data-driven tool that
provides subscribers with measurable data needed to make informed decisions
regarding the environmental attributes of a paper product. West Linn Paper
Company evaluates its products and manufacturing processes each year and
develops data for each of the 19 EPAT performance indicators. For more
information on the EPAT visit: www.epat.org