Elephant Print and Display has become one of the first UK companies to offer climate neutral paper printing in association with climate consultancy ClimatePartner. But can that be extended to other substrates?
“Yes, we think we can provide climate neutral printing on vinyl and other media in time,” says Jason Gadd, managing director of Elephant Print and Display when asked if he believes if the company’s new environmental initiative in regards to paper printing can be developed for other substrates more commonly used in large-format inkjet printing.
The East Sussex-based digital print company has just become one of the first UK companies to offer climate neutral printing in association with German-based climate consultancy ClimatePartner. It can now calculate the CO2 greenhouse gas emissions for each of its paper-based print jobs, enabling a contribution to be made to an internationally recognised carbon offset project that ensures that reforestation and protection of those natural resources is continued.
The PSP - which runs two digital press and two large-format inkjet printers, powered entirely by solar energy - has chosen to support The Kasigau Wildlife Korridor in Kenya, situated in the Taita Taveta District, as its project for the initiative.
The carbon emissions caused by the materials, production processes and transportation involved in each paper-based print job - including those undertaken on its Epson SureColor S50600 and HP DesignJet 26100 - are all taken into account.
As part of the process, every climate neutral printing job carried out by Elephant will be documented with its own unique ID, providing full transparency for the carbon offsetting process. At the end of each completed print application project, a certificate is then generated for each customer, identifying their total emissions involved in the production of their respective job, and detailing that they have been offset. The customer can also use their unique ID code to see for themselves how their emissions have been offset, providing clear traceability throughout the process.
Gadd says of the new service: “ClimatePartner have been very thorough in helping us with training and setting up the system, it works well with our MIS and our customers are very happy to contribute to climate protection with their print work.
He continues: “We at Elephant Print and Display are really pleased to be able to offer climate neutral printing and this fits in really well with the philosophy of our business. Climate protection and the use of renewable energy has increasingly become an important part of what we do. The cost is generally only about 1% to 2% of the finished job which I think is good value - to be able to offer this service and still stay competitive is essential.”
So what about non-paper-based print jobs?
“While we do undertake paper-based print, such as poster work, on our large-format devices, we obviously also use them for vinyl jobs too, and we’d like to extend the carbon offsetting to those. We do a lot of roller-banners for instance and we are already talking to ClimatePartner about including these in a system and genuinely believe we can work out a solution longer term. At the moment it’s very early days and there’s a lot of data to be acquired etc., but I think it will happen down the line.”
Commenting on its work so far with Elephant Print, Moritz Lehmkuhl, managing director of ClimatePartner, says: “Elephant Print is helping its corporate customers to realise their climate protection strategies and to make their contribution to climate protection. ClimatePartner is very pleased to be working together with Elephant Print, and this will help to strengthen the commitment to climate protection in the UK.
“Climate change is the biggest challenge of the 21st century. Individual companies need to make their contribution as well. The use of climate neutral print products offers companies the opportunity to become active in climate protection quickly, and easily. In climate neutral printing, the greenhouse gas emissions produced by the printing process are precisely calculated, which allows the biggest emission drivers and reduction potential to be identified.”
He adds: “Through investment in internationally recognised carbon offset projects, the unavoidable CO2 emissions can then be offset, and the print products can thus be rendered climate neutral. Elephant Print makes the contribution to climate protection – with ClimatePartner.”