L’Oreal goes green
November 4, 2009
An interesting story has just been released on Cosmetics Design saying that global cosmetic giant L’Oreal has unveiled it’s first 100% carbon-neutral production plant in Belgium.
L’Oreal has been working on the factory in Libramont, for the past three years, pairing with Belgian energy companies Eneco and Bio Energy. Using new technology, it can function without using the national electric or gas grids and works by converting natural materials into biogas that creates heat and electricity.
The process is quite unglamorous - Biomass is collected from local farmers, converted into methane through fermentation and then piped to the factory.
The power is not just for making lipsticks and whipping up shampoos - the biogas plant will generate more electricity than needed so will feed the surplus back into the public grid. Valerie Pierrut, communications manager for L’Oreal Libramont explained that the factory will use mostly electricity with 20% of its power needs coming from gas. For most of the year the plant will be running at a surplus however she did admit that during winter it may go into deficit. Basically though, the surplus power will offset the CO2 emissions produced by the natural gas consumption making the factory carbon-neutral.
L’Oreal has plans to reduce its worldwide CO2 emissions by over 50% by 2015 and this plant is an important step in this process. While Libramont is the first factory to receive the green treatment, L’Oreal plans to use the technology in its other plants in France.
Well done L’Oreal - this gets the green thumb from us!
Tamsin xo
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