Ant Packaging - Australia's First Carbon Neutral Plastics Factory

Effective Tuesday 10 June 2008 Ant Packaging Pty Ltd became Australia's first Carbon Neutral plastics manufacturer. We have calculated our business' emissions and have offset them with government certified carbon abatement projects.

At Ant Packaging we recognize there is a perception that plastics manufacturing is considered harmful to the environment. The reality is that plastics are a effective use of a waste product from the energy resource production process that would otherwise be released to harm the ozone layer. However, we acknowledge that we use energy; therefore we generate greenhouse gas emissions and thus are a contributor to climate change.

We take our responsibility seriously enough to have done something about it!

We recently commissioned local Byron Bay company Cool Planet to prepare calculations for the carbon emissions associated with our business operations. The results are published under the guidelines of the Greenhouse Gas Protocol which is the most widely used international accounting tool for building credible and effective programs for tackling climate change.

Cool Planet calculated our emissions to include electricity consumption, office supplies, product distribution, plane transport and staff transport at an annual 559 tonnes of GHG.

That total has now been offset by the purchase of Renewable Energy Certificates from Greenpower approved generators and Carbon Offsets from projects accredited by the Australian Government's Greenhouse Friendly program. The projects involve the design and installation of Photovoltaic Stand Alone Power Supply systems (solar panels) in the Byron Shire and the Regional Resource Recovery Centre in Western Australia which diverts household rubbish from landfill to compost. This project won last year's Greenhouse Challenge Plus award for outstanding achievement in greenhouse gas abatement.

Ant Packaging will continue to strive to be pro-active in its business practices. Becoming the first carbon neutral plastics factory in Australia is a positive step forward in helping to address the effects our industry has on climate change.