DANZER BLOG

On a sustainable mission

On a sustainable mission

According to the UN World Commission on Environment and Development: “Sustainable development is a development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”. Great definition, right? But what does it mean? In simple terms, acting sustainably means considering first the effect of our actions on environment, society and economy.

Sustainability is for everyone: a family, a company, a community and even a single person. Did you know that using a pressure cooker can save 50 % of energy while cooking? Or that only 5 % of the power drawn by a phone charger is used to charge the phone and the other 95 % is wasted when it is left plugged in? Or again, that by turning off the tap while brushing your teeth, you can save up to 700 liters of water per month?

Impressive, isn’t it? Well, now imagine how relevant energy and water savings can be for a company with an electricity consumption of almost 50,000 MWh per year and that needs more than 600,000 m3 water per year.

Sustainability leaves

When I came to work at Danzer, I understood straightaway the value given to sustainability: We want to be responsible for our actions by working on all the aspects that influence the environmental, social and economic impact of our company. Sustainability is of course a lot more than tackling useless costs – like saving water and energy - it’s also about creating better work conditions, improving employee motivation and retention, complying with legislation and being transparent to our stakeholders.

As a member of our Sustainability and Compliance team, my job is to maintain and improve our Environmental and Safety Management System (ESMS), to support local responsibles with environmental issues and to collect data for the Danzer Sustainability Report. Currently, we are working on upgrading our ESMS in order to be compliant with the new ISO 14001:2015 requirements. We aim to build a system based on a common framework across Danzer. The challenge is to build a standard system for the group, keeping flexibility and adaptability for the specifics of each workplace.

This work has given me the possibility to discover Danzer worldwide; I am traveling often and working with many different people. Thanks to these experiences I am learning the importance of diversity, both on a geographical and on a human level.
I am personally convinced of the significance of sustainability nowadays and I consider this a great motivation for my daily work. I am glad to have the possibility to spread this concept and to help Danzer continually improve.


References


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About the Author

Pietro Brussich

Environmental Engineer

Pietro Brussich is an environmental engineer, working at Danzer since 2015. He obtained his Master’s degree studying at 3 different universities in Italy and Portugal. After a first internship within the Danzer Sustainability Report project, he joined the Sustainability and Compliance Team as environmental expert. His role is to maintain and improve our Environmental and Safety Management System (ESMS) and to support local responsibles with environmental issues. He lives in Dresden (Germany) and in his free time he likes to travel, read and do sports - in particular football and climbing.