Waste

Pollution and waste generation threatens our environment and the availability of natural resources on which we depend. Thus, we do our utmost to continuously minimise waste and strive for optimal recycling flows at our production sites and offices.

Our production processes are designed to minimise waste output and to generate valuable by-products alongside our intentional products. Both our final products and by-products are readily biodegradable and ecologically safe. Our by-products are sold for use in feed, agriculture, construction and biogas production. Furthermore, there are different types of waste generated in our plants. 

Traditional production processes of citric acid and lactic acid use lime in fermentation, resulting in the generation of gypsum as a side stream. Gypsum waste, with a potentially negative impact on the environment, is typically landfilled, due to its impurity profile. Jungbunzlauer introduced already decades ago a gypsum-free production process for citric acid at our production site in Austria. Today most of our Austrian citric acid is produced with the gypsum-free process. The older pro-duction line still applies the gypsum process, being only used to fulfil market demand that cannot be covered by the gypsum-free  process. Most of the gypsum is a by-product, used in construction after purification and drying. The rest is still landfilled. 

At our Canadian production site we only use the gypsum-free production process to manufacture citric acid, which was selected as the process of choice there from the design of the plant more than 20 years ago. Thanks to purification technology transfer from citric acid to lactic acid, our lactic acid factory, started more than 10 years ago at our French production site, was the first lactic acid plant worldwide to run an industrial scale gypsum-free production process.

In addition, large volume raw materials and chemicals are delivered in bulk by river or train where feasible, or otherwise by tipper, tank and silo truck, thereby avoiding large volumes of packaging waste in our production sites, and upstream in the value chain.

Each production site and office location manage waste individually according to national regulations. Definitions are in place for the different waste categories, and recycling or disposal requirements are specified. Each production site has a designated person responsible for waste management. This manager takes care of the collection, segregation and handling, recording and reporting of waste. In addition, we work together with specialised partners, whose scopes of responsibilities are also clearly defined. Waste generated is measured and reported regularly internally and to the authorities for each of our production sites, in compliance with the framework of national requirements. Individual improvement goals regarding waste are set at each production site and progress is recorded. Waste management organisation and data are reported in the annual Responsible Care^® Report for each production site. Furthermore, waste management is covered by the external audits conducted for the Responsible Care^® certification of our Austrian and Canadian sites, and for the ISO 14001 certification of the environmental management system of our German site. 

Waste management is also a topic in customer meetings and questionnaires. Packaging waste from our finished products is of particular interest due to new and upcoming regulations. Jungbunzlauer aims to reduce the need for packaging materials by offering bulk deliveries wherever possible. We also supply products in different types of packaging, e.g. semi-bulk packaging like Big Bags or IBCs, and non-bulk packaging like bags, cardboard boxes or pails. We support collection and re-use (IBCs) or use packaging materials (e.g. polyethylene, polypropylene, cardboard, wood) that can be easily recycled.

We strive for an ongoing reduction in waste and for optimal recycling flows. Production processes will continuously be improved where possible to minimise process waste generation. It is our ambition to minimise waste to landfill in all production sites, especially the residual gypsum waste in Austria and filter aid waste in Canada.