L'Oréal Group’s North Asia Zone is the first of the company’s zones worldwide to achieve carbon neutrality across all operated sites, plants, distribution centers, offices and research & innovation centers spanning five geographic markets of Mainland China, Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
L'Oréal North Asia Zone has achieved several firsts on the company’s CO2 emissions reduction roadmap. Mainland China was the first market worldwide to achieve carbon neutrality for all L'Oréal sites in 2019. Now with the Japan market achieving carbon neutrality for its sites in July 2022, L'Oréal North Asia became the first zone of the L'Oréal Group to achieve carbon neutrality for all the sites it operates.
In both Mainland China and South Korea, CO2 emissions reduction through installing onsite renewable energy generating facilities has been an important contribution to the overall effort. At L’Oréal’s BeautyCos plant in Suzhou, onsite solar panels have been generating 1.2M kWh of electricity every year since 2015. Similarly, the rooftop solar panels installed at L’Oréal’s distribution center in Suzhou provided 100% of its 4.4M kWh electricity needs since 2019.
In addition to its solar power generating system, a Combined Heat and Power (CHP) system was built onsite to use biogas to produce steam, electricity and heat with high efficiency. The biogas is generated by a biomass energy project at Suzhou Industrial Park, which uses kitchen and landscaping waste as raw materials for energy generation. Combining solar power generation, CHP system installation and sourcing renewable electricity nearby, BeautyCos achieved carbon neutrality in 2019.
In addition to having onsite facilities generating renewable energy, L’Oréal sites in North Asia pursued the best way to source local renewable energy.
In Mainland China, L’Oréal’s Yichang Tianmei Plant achieved carbon neutrality with 100% use of hydropower in 2018. Other L’Oréal China offices and campuses adopted solutions to drastically reduce their CO2 emissions through partnerships with a renewable energy project in Jiangsu Province.
L’Oréal Korea started participating in Korea’s RE100 system (a global initiative on renewable power) in 2021 and received renewable energy certification from Korea Electric Power Corporation (KEPCO) for the energy used across all its offices and distribution centers.
In its Japanese plant in Gotemba, L’Oréal has installed new electrical boilers using renewable electricity. L'Oréal Japan met its carbon neutrality goals by participating in the Green Power and Heat Certificates initiative for its research & innovation center, offices and plant. The initiative sponsors renewable energy generation facilities that are validated by the local authorities that encompass areas such as wind, biomass, hydro, and solar power stations.
L'Oréal Taiwan is the first company in the market to channel its renewable energy efforts through Power Purchasing Agreements with local authorities and the landlord of the commercial building where it operates. This enabled the organization to achieve its carbon neutrality status in late 2021.
Similarly, L’Oréal Hong Kong site achieved carbon neutrality in 2020 with the implementation of energy efficiency measures, the installation of LED lighting to reduce energy consumption, and sourcing local renewable electricity for its office.
Other sustainable efforts in the beauty sector include WWP Beauty, a full-service supplier to the global beauty industry, which has launched two new packaging collections in Eastman’s Cristal One Renew and Cristal Renew. The two companies have been working together since 2021 when WWP Beauty obtained its International Sustainability & Carbon Certification (ISCC), which certifies that the molecular recycled content of products can be traced through the entire development cycle, from creation to manufacturing.
Another such effort is the Estée Lauder Companies’ recently implemented system that applies heat and cool technology to its manufacturing systems, which will shorten the production process and help reduce waste.
Origin Materials and Revlon have also announced a joint initiative to develop carbon negative materials for next generation cosmetics packaging. As part of the initiative, Revlon has signed a memorandum of understanding to reserve commercial volumes of Origin PET.
