Making it easier for customers to achieve their sustainability objectives
At Essentra we are aiming to be the world’s leading, responsible, hassle free supplier of essential industrial components. We are committed to supporting our customers to achieve their sustainability goals and objectives, by developing sustainable industrial component solutions for them.
Find out more information by exploring the sections below
Creating a more sustainable manufacturing process for our customers, our people and the planet sits at the heart of Essentra's ESG strategy.
Scott Fawcett
Chief Executive Officer, Essentra
Our ESG strategy
In our refreshed Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) framework, we have created five key pillars which will help us to fulfil our own ambitious corporate sustainability goals, as well as helping our customers to achieve theirs too. These 5 pillars are:
Our Planet
Driving resource and energy efficiency, reducing emissions and embracing renewables.
Our Components
Developing innovative products using renewables, recyclables, reusables and biodegradables.
Our Culture
A safe, supportive work environment that champions equality and celebrates diversity.
Our Communities
Working with suppliers to ensure ethical practices and contribute to equitable economies. Volunteering our time and supporting good causes.
Our Customers
Providing a hassle free service that helps customers achieve their sustainability goals.
Our Planet
We want to end our dependency on virgin fossil materials and fuels, making significant emissions reductions across our value chain through energy efficiency, renewables, material and transport choices.
We have set out clear targets to reduce our emissions and reach net zero, which have been approved by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). You can read more about our emissions reduction targets and plans to reach net zero in our Climate Transition Plan.
Reducing our operational emissions
Our target: reduce our scope one and two GHG emissions by 50% by 2030 from a 2019 baseline, and reach net-zero by 2040 at the latest.
Our progress: in 2023, we achieved a 38% reduction in scope one and two GHG emissions since 2019. We have reached this by:
- continuing to transition to renewable energy across our sites, which now accounts for just under half of our total electricity usage.
- continuing to implement operational energy efficiency projects. In 2023, we completed 12 projects across seven sites. These ranged from injection moulding machine replacements at several sites, installation of lighting sensors at our site in Ningbo in China, LED installations at our site in Erie in the USA, and a new chiller system at our Barcelona site.
- investing in solar panel schemes on our manufacturing facilities.
Our solar projects
Rayong
- We installed a 6,000m2 solar array at one of our largest global manufacturing sites located in Rayong, Thailand in December 2022
- We estimate that the solar array will avoid annual greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) generated by the site by over 450 tonnes of CO2e each year.
Yichun
- We installed solar array at our largest global manufacturing sites located in Yichun, China in September 2023
- We estimate that the solar array will avoid annual greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) generated by the site by over 1000 tonnes of CO2e each year.
Reducing our value chain emissions
Our target: reduce our scope three GHG emissions intensity, from purchased goods and services, and upstream transportation and distribution by 55% per GBP of value added by 2030 from a 2022 baseline, and reach net-zero by 2050 at the latest.
Our progress: in 2023, we achieved a 30% reduction in scope three GHG emissions intensity since 2022.
We have worked hard to understand and find means of reducing our value chain emissions by identifying our most significant scope three areas. The largest areas of our scope three emissions are the goods and services we purchase, and the transport we use both upstream with our suppliers and downstream to our customers.
In purchased goods and services, we have commenced engagement with our metals and packaging suppliers to collaborate on emissions reduction initiatives. We will be continuing this in 2024 and expanding to incorporate more suppliers across our value chain.
Within our product transportation, we have implemented a third-party shipment tracking service, which allows us to optimise the route and mode of shipments, reducing emissions by ensuring each shipment is using the most efficient methods available.
Reducing our waste usage
Our target: all sites to achieve zero waste to landfill by 2030 at the latest.
Our progress: 34% of Components sites achieved zero waste to landfill in 2023.
Our target: reduce overall waste volumes by 50% by 2030, compared to 2019.
Our progress: our waste intensity has reduced 28% compared to 2019.
We aim to be zero waste to landfill across our operations, as well as minimising the waste we generate across the product lifecycle.
In 2023, 94% all of our solid waste was diverted from landfill, an increase of 18% compared to 2022, and our waste intensity has reduced by 28% against our 2019 baseline.
In 2024, waste is a specific area of focus for our management and site teams, and 57% of all employees will have a waste reduction measure as part of their bonus objectives.
Our nature-related impacts
We monitor our water consumption across our manufacturing, distribution and office sites and report on this annually. In 2024, we plan to begin reporting on water usage per head and create an action plan for our Silivri, Yichun and Ningbo sites, which account for just under 80% of our total water usage. We report on this annually in our CDP water questionnaire.
We have commenced the process of identifying and assessing Essentra’s wider nature-related impacts and dependencies in preparation to responding to the taskforce for nature-related disclosures (TNFD) recommendations and will disclose these in 2024.
Our Components
We will strive to design new products through the innovative use of renewable, reusable, recyclable and biodegradable materials. Our Centre of Excellence provides a space for ideas to flourish into innovative new products to showcase to our customers.
Using more sustainable materials in our products
Our target: 50% of raw materials from sustainable sources by 2030 across our polymer ranges. 100% of raw materials from sustainable sources by 2030 across our general protection and security seal ranges.
Our progress: in 2023, we hit our 2025 target early, achieving 20.7% of sustainable materials in our polymer ranges.
As an active participant in the circular economy, Essentra are a signatory of the European Commission’s Circular Plastics Alliance. This solidifies our commitment to increasing the use of recycled polymer raw materials in our product range globally.
In 2023, we have increased the number of products and sites that have transitioned to using recycled content in our polymer ranges. We now have seven manufacturing sites globally where recycled content is used as standard, across a range of over 7,000 products.
Case Study: Centre of Excellence
In 2023, we launched our Centre of Excellence to accelerate our progress in developing sustainable materials. This dedicated space at our Kidlington, UK site will be used to trial a wide array of materials with sustainability benefits such as recycled and bio-based, using the latest technology.
Reducing our packaging impacts
Our target: support a circular economy by ensuring 100% of our packaging is reusable, recyclable or compostable by 2030.
Our progress: 58% of our packaging is reusable, widely recyclable or compostable.
Our target: 50% recycled content in our packaging materials by 2030.
Our progress: 28% recycled content in our packaging.
Packaging is an important part of our resource usage and is key to ensuring our products are delivered hassle-free to our customers. In 2022 we implemented a reuse scheme for cardboard packaging for product movements from our Nettetal distribution hub in Germany, avoiding the creation and recycling of over 1,600 pallet boxes per year.
Case study: collaborating with suppliers to support packaging goals
Working closely with packaging suppliers, the Kidlington distribution team focused on replacing transport packaging with more sustainable options. For example:
- plastic used to fill voids has been replaced by 100% recycled cardboard, created by converting waste cardboard on site
- plastic mailers have been replaced with paper versions containing 20% recycled paper
- the tape used to seal boxes is now made from widely recyclable paper, and the adhesive is biodegradable.
This pillar focuses on creating a safe, supportive work environment that champions equality and celebrates diversity.
Health, safety and wellbeing
Our target: zero accidents for our people and visitors.
Our progress: lost time incidents reduced by 57% in 2023.
Our target: mental health training to 80% of leaders by 2024.
Our progress: 9% of leaders have received mental health training.
Our target: healthy lifestyles campaigns at 50% of sites by 2025.
Our progress: healthy lifestyles campaigns launched in 2024.
Our commitment to safety in 2023 resulted in tangible improvements, ranging from increased visibility and accountability among leaders to successful hazard reduction initiatives. Fourteen projects were completed in the year. This included a pedestrian segregation project, improving the separation of pedestrians from vehicles at each site and a risk reduction programme in our site in Yichun, which resulted in all initial high-risk issues identified to be resolved or reduced to a low-level risk.
As well as physical health and safety, we recognise the importance of our people’s mental health and wellbeing. We currently have 24 mental health first-aiders trained across the business, and in-house capability to train our people in mental health first aid. We have also commenced our healthy lifestyle campaigns, starting with a global walking challenge in February 2024, this will be followed up with a rolling programme of activities during 2024.
Our commitment to being an ethical employer
Our target: 100% of employees trained on Ethics Code biannually.
Our progress: 99% of employees trained on Ethics Code.
Our Ethics Code is the core foundation of our compliance strategy and is issued to all employees globally. It is supported by a comprehensive training schedule, both online, virtual face to face and in person training that is delivered by our in house team.
We are proud that in 2023, we joined the United Nations (“UN”) Global Compact initiative, confirming our commitment to responsible business practices, human rights and our support of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The UN Global Compact is a voluntary leadership platform for the development, implementation and disclosure of responsible business practices.
Championing equality and celebrating diversity
Our target: 40% women in leadership teams by 2025.
Our progress: 31% of women in leadership teams at end of 2023.
Our target: 25% of leaders identify as ethnically diverse by 2030.
Our progress: 17% of leaders identify as ethnically diverse in 2023.
In 2023, we progressed in our journey to create a more diverse, equitable and inclusive workplace. We have, for the first time, collected information on the ethnic diversity of our senior leadership team, and found that 17% of employees in the team identify as ethnically diverse.
Our overall diversity, equality and inclusion (“DE&I”) goals are supported by series of campaigns related to various topics including Pride, Black History Month, International Women’s Day and International Men’s Day.
In 2024, we are focusing on a broader DE&I strategy that complements and supports our ESG strategy. This strategy covers all facets of DE&I, and brings together the targets and campaigns we run throughout the year, supported by activities to ensure we attract, recruit, train and retain diverse talent across our business.
View our Gender Pay Gap reports.
Our Communities
We work with our suppliers, local communities and wider family to ensure our values, ethical practices and processes provide equitable outcomes, as well as volunteering our time supporting good causes.
Developing an ethical supply chain
Our target: our supplier code of conduct refreshed and launched in 2023 to all suppliers over £100k.
Our progress: 18% of suppliers targeted have agreed to our new Supplier Code so far.
Our target: 70% of suppliers by spend actively risk monitored.
Our progress: 75% of suppliers by spend actively risk monitored (all suppliers over a material spend threshold).
We are committed to conducting our business in a responsible and ethical manner. We recognise that our suppliers play a crucial role in our value chain and share in our commitment to upholding high standards of integrity, sustainability, and social responsibility. Our supply chain is a core component of our business, with over 1000 raw material and goods for resale vendors supplying over 50,000 products.
We believe that our suppliers are integral partners in achieving our ESG goals. By agreeing to operate to our Supplier Code, suppliers demonstrate their commitment to our key principles:
- health, safety and the environment
- respecting human and labour rights
- acting with integrity, ethics and compliance
- collaboration with us towards a more sustainable and responsible future.
View our supplier code of conduct.
Supporting good causes
Our target: Community Engagement Policy in action with a volunteer day taken by 25% of employees during 2023
Our progress: 13% of employees took a community engagement day in 2023.
We engage with our local communities around the world to create a positive impact through initiatives that positively impact those in need, improving their lives, the community and the local economy.
We relaunched our Community Engagement Policy in 2023 during our Sustainability Week in April, increasing visibility of the option that every employee has to receive one days paid leave each year to volunteer, and providing guidance to all of our employees on how they could spend their time.
During the last year, our employees volunteered to support a wide variety of good causes across the world, illustrating the wide range of local communities our employees work and live in. Some examples include our employees in the UK taking part in beach cleans around the country, and helping a local school to tidy up their gardens. In the USA, our Louisville team adopted a local park, becoming stewards of Riverview Park which they will look after with various projects throughout the year.
Case Study: Coral restoration in Rayong
In December 2023, 224 of our Rayong employees participated in a local project to help regenerate local coral reefs.
The team worked in conjunction with the Thai Navy to plant live coral cuttings. This project will help to improve the reef and encourage improved biodiversity.
Our Customers
This pillar focuses on supporting our customers to achieve their sustainability goals. Our purpose is to help customers build a sustainable future, and as the only global manufacturer and distributor of our kind, we are in a leading position to assist customers by providing products and services that have been developed to provide a hassle free sustainable choice.
Our target: increasing the number of products introduced with sustainability criteria.
Our progress: 750 products in 2023 introduced with sustainability criteria.
We are committed to continuing to invest in developing new products with improved sustainability performance and lower lifecycle emissions, and providing our customers with expert advice on the most sustainable choice for their needs.
In 2023, we introduced 750 new products that provide a sustainability benefit. This includes products with lower embedded GHG emissions, increased recycled content or biomaterials, and improved circularity. Our total products with sustainability features figure now stands at 7,981.
We commenced the work to establish product carbon footprints for our vast and diverse range of products in 2023, and delivered product-level footprints across our product categories, including our general protection and electronics ranges to our customers. We intend to continue and expand on this work in 2024 to provide product carbon footprints across our full ranges.
Case Study: Ingeteam
In 2023, we were given the opportunity to supply Ingeteam with our full product range. Ingeteam can now source the wide variety of electrical, general protection and access hardware components they need from one place, saving time, creating efficiency and reducing packaging and transport emissions.
ESG reporting centre
Essentra believe in being transparent about our sustainability journey, progress and challenges. We disclose our data to CDP and Ecovadis annually to meet the needs of our customers who request this information and help us to identify areas for improvement.
Below are our latest ESG reporting documents:
Our ESG ratings
Our ESG strategy and reporting is aligned to external standards and we are rated by several external benchmarking agencies.
External Standards we align to:
Our ESG ratings and disclosures:
CDP Climate Change 2023: A-
Read our latest CDP climate change response.
CDP Water Security 2023: B
Read our latest CDP water response.
EcoVadis rating: Silver
View our latest EcoVadis certificate.
View our EcoVadis Performance Overview.
MSCI ESG rating: AA
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Contact us
Contact us to discuss your sustainable product solution request through the local sales team. You can speak to our team about your sustainability challenges.