Colombia. Pintuco's main plant located in the municipality of Rionegro, Antioquia, obtained the Carbon Neutral certificate granted by Icontec. Being the first company in the paints and coatings sector in Colombia to receive this recognition.
This Icontec certification includes the operations carried out between 2016 and 2017, a period in which they compensated 4,441.2 tCO2e through the BanCO2 Plus project, with which they contributed to the support of peasants who have plots with native forest and water sources in Eastern Antioquia, the area in which the plant is located.
"Being Carbon Neutral is the result of an organization's commitment to reducing and offsetting Greenhouse Gases (GHGs). This certification involves making an inventory of the sources of GHG emissions, measuring annually the totality of emissions and defining and implementing strategies aimed at reducing emissions," the company's statement said.
The company carried out the following process with which it obtained the certification:
- Intention: Since 2013 Pintuco measures its CO2e emissions and implements actions that allow it to reduce the number of tons of CO2e emitted in its production, although only until 2018 the organization decided to be certified in Carbon Neutrality, taking 2016 as the base year.
- Measurement: Every year Pintuco measures GHGs through the company GAIA.
- Verification: Action carried out by Icontec, with the aim of having an external entity that guarantees compliance with standards established by international organizations.
- Compensation: Through the BanCO2 Plus project, Pintuco provides farmers with the care of forests that capture CO2 equivalent to that emitted by their operation.
- Decrease: Within the company, actions are carried out to reduce CO2e emissions, through the optimization of electricity and fuel consumption. From 2016 to 2017 for every gallon produced by Pintuco, CO2e emissions decreased by 42%.
Some of the actions that Pintuco has implemented for the reduction of Greenhouse Gases (GHG) are: Installation of LED lighting, implementation of high efficiency engines and furnaces, efficiency in cold systems and time control in the steam extraction systems in the process, and automation focused on reducing energy consumption, compressed air and efficient nitrogen. In addition, the company carries out an awareness work with all its employees in the plant, focused on the search for energy efficiency.
This type of action, in addition to certification, allows Pintuco to obtain other achievements such as the 15% decrease in energy consumption in KWH per gallon of paint produced in 2017 compared to 2016.
