Demand for eco-labelled products is greater than ever and the construction industry is no exception. “Our customers are increasingly asking for eco-assessed products. We want to help then find the right ones,” explains Åsa Danielsson, environment and licensing manager at Benders.
Benders Sverige currently has five units with environmental certification. These are Bålsta, Hjo, Edsvära, Frillesås and Braås. However, the ambition is to have even more. “Our plan is to continue with Bohusgranit Ekonomisk association and Benders Isolering AB,” reveals Åsa.
Benders’ products are registered and rated by SundaHus, Basta and are also part of the Byggvarubedömningen (Environmental Evaluation of Building Products) system. Updating and assessment of declarations in respect of existing and new construction goods will be a priority in 2015.
Environmental goals for 2015
A major, ongoing, environmental initiative, which is also one of the environmental goals for 2015, is to set up even more efficient internal transport with lower emissions. In concrete terms, this involves increasing the use of trains rather than lorries and finding ways to make lorry transport more efficient. “We have run very successful initiatives in this area for a number of years. Benders even won the DB Schenker Logistics Award in 2010,” comments Åsa.
Other environmental goals for the next few years are to reduce the costs of waste handling and to decrease Benders’ electricity consumption. “We have just started an initiative that minutely examines our operations to see where we use most energy unnecessarily. We must then give site managers the tools to reduce such consumption. For example, a lot of lighting energy can be saved simply by replacing all light bulbs with LED equivalents,” explains Ingemar Arvidsson, electrical coordinator at Benders. To monitor this change initiative, each site manager can go to a website where he or she can see present consumption shown per day, week, month and year.
Our environmental goals have been developed and decided based on the environmental aspects where Benders has the clearest impact. “We constantly strive to have as little negative impact on the environment as possible,” concludes Åsa.
A constant, major, ongoing initiative is making transport more efficient with lower emissions. Benders has long been good at this, but will be taking things even further!
