DERIX becomes climate neutral:
Excellent CO₂ balance as a basis

The DERIX-Group has joined the “Climate Protection Wood Industry” initiative and had an extensive CO₂-balance* carried out for the entire company. For this purpose, the emissions of all corporate divisions (production, energy supply and upstream or third-party services) were determined and converted into CO₂ equivalents (CO₂e) depending on their damaging effect on the climate.

The aim of this measure was, on the one hand, to derive new impulses for the DERIX-Group’s corporate climate protection strategy from the results. Secondly, the results of the balance sheet create the basis for the planned offsetting of emissions in 2023, which will then make DERIX-Group a climate-neutral company.

Sustainable management and resource conservation are central guidelines of the DERIX-Group. Therefore, the company has implemented a whole range of initiatives in recent months and years to keep improving its production processes and administrative area. For example, since 2021 DERIX has been the first company in the industry to take back its wooden elements after use in order to reuse the wood for the production of new constructions and components in the sense of a consistent circular economy. The product “DERIX X-LAM” is Cradle to Cradle certified, the company’s energy supply is fed by the company’s own PV systems supplemented by green electricity and with the internal initiative “DERIX for future”, processes and structures within the DERIX Group are designed to be more sustainable and environmentally friendly.

“Our continuous commitment to sustainability and environmental protection shows why the “climate-neutral company” status we are striving for is actually just another consistent step towards maximum climate protection for us,” explains Simone Derix, commercial director of the DERIX-Group and member of the management board. “We are particularly pleased that the emission values determined are extraordinarily low. This is an excellent testimony to our work in the area of sustainability and climate protection in recent years,” says Derix.

The approximately 800 t of CO₂ emitted by the entire DERIX-Group in 2021 is not only extremely low compared to other manufacturing companies of its size. In addition, the positive effect that DERIX products have in the area of climate protection has not even been taken into account in this excellent balance. For example, the company’s wood products manufactured in 2021 alone will bind more than 54,000 t of CO₂.

However, the low CO₂ equivalents of the balance sheet not only show how effectively the company has implemented its sustainability strategy in recent years. They also form an optimal basis for achieving climate neutrality.

Kai Lambertz, project manager at Gesellschaft für Klimaschutz für die Holzindustrie (GKH GmbH), comments: “We were pleasantly surprised by the DERIX-Group’s accounting results. Through numerous reduction measures implemented in the years before, significant emission sources could already be eliminated. As a result, an extremely positive result was achieved for a manufacturing company. A one hundred percent emission-free production company is currently not (yet) technologically feasible. The DERIX-Group has already optimised many things and effectively implemented a number of sensible measures,” praised the auditor.

A balancing of the calculated CO₂ balance is planned for the beginning of 2023. It is to be done by investing in reforestation projects.