Lenzing Sustainability Report Details Updated Targets

Meghan Hall
·5 min read

Lenzing released its 2023 sustainability report Friday, boosting spirits around the company’s efforts after simultaneously dropping less-than-savory earnings as the next-generation materials market continues to waver.

The 129-page report took a deep dive into the greenhouse gas emissions targets, progress around green energy, the ways the next-generation materials company partners to make targets reality and more.

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New emissions targets 

The Austrian company has set new targets relative to its greenhouse gas emissions. It will seek to reduce scope 1 and scope 2 GHG emissions by 42 percent and decrease scope 3 emissions by 25 percent by 2030. It has also set a new target for 2050: to achieve at least a 90 percent reduction in absolute GHG emissions across scopes 1, 2 and 3.

Both of the new targets, endorsed by the SBTi, will use 2021 emissions as a baseline.

Even despite the ambitious new targets, the progress toward Lenzing’s previous GHG emissions targets has continued. The company noted it is “on track” to meet the previous target, which was to reduce scopes 1, 2 and 3 emissions by 50 percent per ton of fiber and pulp sold by 2030. That target was based on its 2017 emissions.

Green energy 

Lenzing exceeded its goal of achieving 100 percent green electricity for four of its sites by 2024, noting that six of its global production facilities have procured 100 percent renewable electricity for operations.

However, it delayed the phase out of coal for its Nanjing, China-based operations, originally targeted to be achieved in 2022. The company noted in the report that, “Gas pipe connections and constructions in Nanjing are ongoing.”

Similarly, Lenzing delayed its target to achieve scope 1 and 2 carbon neutrality at its facility in Prachinburi, Thailand by using 100 percent bioenergy to power the facility. It noted in the report that the reason for the delay is that the site “has been facing some challenges to consistently receive 100 percent biomass energy due to the reliability of [the] biomass cogeneration plant of [its] supply partner.”

However, it explained, the Thailand site did achieve 100 percent biomass energy in October and November of last year.

While it continues to broker a deal with its energy supplier to stabilize biomass energy for the plant, Lenzing said client and consumer priorities have shifted because of a difficult economy, tight budgets and more.

“Given [the] current global economic situation, many businesses and end customers have been deprioritizing sustainability in favor of low-cost sourcing and therefore have less willingness to pay for low-carbon products. Customer engagement has been taking place to position fiber products with low carbon footprint for supporting scope 3 emissions reduction of customers.”

Bringing next-generation materials global

According to the fiber manufacturer, it has succeeded in converting its Nanjing, China-based production line to Tencel-branded modal fibers. The facility, which has an annual capacity of about 35,000 tons, is the first time Tencel has been produced for textiles and clothing in China.

In addition, the Ganni partner converted its Purwakarta, Indonesia site, enabling the production of EcoVero and Veocel viscose fibers. The company noted the conversion required “significant technical improvements.” The fibers coming out of the plant are EU Ecolabel certified.

The Veocel-branded fibers, it contends, are a low-carbon product that it now can offer globally.

Waste upgrades

Lenzing reported producing much more waste in 2023 than it did in 2022, which it attributes to the addition of two facilities to its network. In 2023, the company generated nearly 188,000 tons of waste, whereas in 2022, it created about 150,000 tons of waste.

However, the amount of hazardous waste it produced dropped by almost half year over year, from about 69,000 tons in 2022 to about 37,000 tons in 2023. This, the company said, is partly because Indonesian regulators shifted waste classifications, rendering boiler ash non-hazardous waste.

Perhaps more notably, the proportion of non-recycled waste the company has created dropped by nearly 50 percentage points. In 2022, non-recycled waste accounted for 68 percent of all waste; in 2023, that figure dipped to 19 percent. Documentation did not fully indicate how Lenzing achieved such a marked drop in a year.

Partnership on textile recycling

The company’s own waste stream isn’t the only place it has worked to implement better recycling initiatives;

Lenzing is working toward more circularity in its supply chains, it noted. In 2023, the company announced it had partnered with textile sorting firm Altstoff Recycling Austria, textile rental firm Salesianer Miettex, textile aggregator Caritas and Swedish pulp producer Södra.

The partners launched the largest textile recycling project in Austria, with the goal of turning post-consumer textile waste into new lyocell and viscose fibers.

“Partnering for systemic change is one of the basic principles of Lenzing’s ‘Naturally Positive’ sustainability strategy for jointly achieving targets with Lenzing’s major stakeholders,” the company wrote in the report.

Accolades

The company maintained its AA classification from rating organization MSCI. It first was upgraded to AA from A in 2022. The CDP ranked Lenzing in all categories on its annual “A list,” rendering it one of ten global companies with a “triple A” rating from the non-profit. It renewed its platinum status EcoVadis rating, which marks it among the top 1 percent of companies rated by the rating body.

Additionally, seven of its production sites appraised by the controversial Higg Facility Environmental Module (FEM) scored “exceptional results.”

Lenzing did not return Sourcing Journal’s request for comment on its report.