Paulig's roasteries devote constant thought to how the environmental friendliness of the production processes can be improved. The production processes are getting to be trimmed to the maximum, so the focus is on polishing details instead of great leaps forward. Small improvements and innovations continued to be made in 2013.

The current roastery in Vuosaari completed its third full year of operation. Thanks to the accumulated experience, it was possible to further optimise the operation of the building's lighting, ventilation and heating as well as the machinery serving these functions. Electricity consumption declined by 2.7% per tonne of production, which is 287 MWh when annualised.

Successful sorting of waste

Close attention has been paid to sorting waste at Paulig. The Vuosaari roastery no longer produces any mixed waste at all. The quantity of energy waste declined by roughly 8 per cent in 2013. The biggest impact on energy waste reduction was improved sorting and reuse of waste plastic. Paulig's partner for waste disposal, Lassila & Tikanoja, considers Paulig a model company for waste sorting and recycling.

The quantity of waste is also monitored at the Tver roastery, but in Russia, society does not yet provide facilities for recycling wastes. The key point at the Tver roastery is to keep the total quantity of waste at the minimum.

Coffee wastage in the Vuosaari roastery's coffee production process was down by roughly 12 per cent on the previous year, falling from the already good figure of 0.85% to 0.75%. This improvement is backed by new ways to reuse materials which would otherwise have become waste. On the packaging lines, the process was improved so that less coffee is wasted. A foreign buyer was found for some of the waste coffee who is able to use it in producing instant coffee products.

Effective packaging

At Paulig, the environmental impacts of packages are reduced in three different ways: reducing the quantity of material used, the greenhouse gases from package production or using non-renewable natural resources. The laminate for coffee packages was further reduced, with the result that 44,000 kg less packaging material was used in 2013 than in 2012.

During 2014, the packaging machine lines at the Vuosaari roastery will be upgraded, which will facilitate the wider use of new, more environmentally friendly packaging materials than at present. The new machinery will also facilitate improved energy-efficiency and working ergonomics.

2013 in figures.