Procter & Gamble

Helping Procter & Gamble achieve zero waste-to-landfill

Procter & Gamble (P&G) is a leading consumer brand that manufactures household names like Gillette, Pampers, and Fairy. The company continues to progress on zero manufacturing waste landfill – 55% of its manufacturing sites have reached zero waste to landfill.

The challenge

P&G had already halved its environmental impact, reducing carbon emissions by 53%, using 52% less energy and 58% less water. When Veolia secured the contract, the company’s Gillette aerosol manufacturing facility in Reading had 77.7% beneficial re-use.

The key goals were to:

• Find beneficial re-use for waste streams
• Help achieve P&G’s zero waste-to- landfill objective
• Use 100% renewable or recycled materials for all products and packaging
• Ensure 90% of product packaging is either recyclable or programmes are in place to create the ability to recycle it

The solution

Veolia reduces costs by finding value in, transforming or eliminating waste to help businesses become more sustainable.

Together with P&G, Veolia reviewed and analysed all waste streams and identified opportunities for recycling. This included sourcing a supplier to sort, palletise and transport cardboard boxes for P&G’s re-use programme.

Veolia were able to reprocess every aerosol component, including extracting gases, recycling the metal and processing  the liquid for Secondary Liquid Fuel, an alternative fuel source for cement kilns. Organic waste from shaving foam is composted and used in the production of turf.

Every month more than 400 large fibreboard drums that were too big to transport are crushed in a specialist machine and sent for energy recovery.

Value delivered

Veolia supported P&G’s zero waste initiative with an innovative service that considered all waste streams and investigated environmentally friendly alternatives, finding ways that they could be re-used for commercial benefit.