Easy ways to improve your environmental footprint

Minimising a company’s environmental impact may appear daunting, but there are numerous aspects of business where they can effect positive change, including some that may not be immediately apparent. By their very nature, factories and industrial workplaces can be dirty and greasy environments with oils, fluids and solvents used, meaning leaks and spills are a regular occurrence.

Workplaces typically use single-use rags or disposable paper roll to mop-up such spills and to clean parts as they are disassembled, repaired and refitted. Like the use of any disposable product, it is inherently wasteful and this practice has a significant environmental impact. Furthermore, they aren’t really all that efficient at absorbing liquids.

A study by the climate-neutral consulting firm, ClimatePartner has shown the enormous ecological footprint of disposable cleaning cloths compared to reusable textile cloths. It compared Mewa UK’s Mewatex wipe with a 100% cellulose paper towel and a non-woven cloth made of 70% cellulose and 30% polypropylene.

The study looked at water and energy consumption, as well as CO₂ emissions during the manufacture and use of both types of wipes. The results showed significant differences, up to 40 times more, in the resources used to remove 1kg of dirt. Among the results it was found that the total amount of water consumed when using a 100% disposable paper towel is 188,500 litres, compared to just 4,538 litres for a re-usable wipe.

Reusable cloths win the day
The energy consumption during production was also clearly contrasting; the reusable cloth consumes nearly three-times less energy than a disposable cloth with 87kWh compared to 31kWh for a reusable cloth. In terms of greenhouse gas emissions generated, disposable wipes cause between 2.8 and 5 times more pollution than reusable cloths: 33.3 and 61.6kg of CO₂ compared to 11.9kg of CO₂.

Also striking was the difference in the amount of textile needed to make the cloths. The amount of textile used in a disposable paper-based cloth is 25.5kg compared to just 0.5kg for a Mewa cloth that has a cleaning life of up to 50 applications. More workplaces are starting to use an industrial cleaning cloth service to deliver high-quality reusable wipes. It is a 360deg service; once soiled, these products are then collected, laundered in an environmentally-friendly way and recirculated for re-use.

This also eliminates the need to manage the purchase, delivery, storage and disposal of single-use materials, not to mention all the wasteful packaging these come in. The service also removes the significant burden of hazardous waste storage and disposal from companies, reducing costs as well as mitigating potential health and safety fines.

Furthermore, because of their re-usability, Wema estimates that the use of its wipes by its customers prevents thousands of tonnes of industrial waste from being created. In summary, small changes a business can make could have a big impact on sustainability – even the selection of a modest cleaning cloth.