Environment

Domtar’s Sustainability Report Highlights Progress in Long-Term Strategy

Jul 18, 2017 10:15 AM ET
Campaign: Domtar's 2017 Sustainability Report

Less waste, lower greenhouse gas emissions, fewer workplace injuries. Less of each of these means a more sustainable business and highlights how Domtar is working smart for the long term.

Our newly released 2017 Sustainability Report details our efforts to take a longer term view of creating and preserving value for our shareholders, customers, employees and communities.

Focused on three main areas -- Caring for People and Communities, Efficient Manufacturing, and Responsible Sourcing and Logistics – the report highlights Domtar’s priorities, challenges and progress.

"Our various stakeholders believe, as do we, that caring about our environment, our communities and our people helps us better meet our business objectives and deliver returns for the long term,” explained John D. Williams, Domtar's president and CEO. “At Domtar, everyone has a role in sustainability. We do not want sustainability to be an annex – we want it to be integrated into our everyday management.”

That commitment to integration resulted in key accomplishments, including:

  • 53 percent reduction in recordable safety incidents since 2008.
  • 33 percent reduction in waste to landfill at pulp and paper mills since 2013.
  • 4,000+ hours contributed by employees at company-sponsored events.
  • 13 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions at pulp and paper mills since 2010.
  • 5 percent reduction in water use at pulp and paper mills since 2012.

Caring for People and Communities
Domtar employees are actively engaged in improving safety, using forward-looking safety techniques. These aim to address potential hazards before they result in an injury. In 2016, employees logged more than 290,000 leading safety activities across the company. These include things like reporting potential unsafe acts and conducting pre-task risk assessments. This approach helps reinforce a culture of employee engagement and contributes to reducing the number and severity of injuries.

Our role in communities goes beyond that of principal employer. For every 100 jobs in our facilities, an additional 325 jobs are created. And within those communities, Domtar contributes thousands of dollars and thousands of hours to improve lives through efforts focused on literacy, health and wellness, and sustainability.

Efficient Manufacturing
Domtar’s three-part approach to improving the sustainability of energy consumption is yielding results. We have converted most of our carbon-intensive, coal-powered boilers to cleaner-burning and less carbon-intensive natural gas. We also are improving efficiency across its mill system and is optimizing its self-generation of electric power.

As a result, 75 percent of the energy used in Domtar pulp and paper mills comes from renewable biomass sources, largely generated from wood processing and pulping byproducts.

Responsible Sourcing and Logistics
Domtar’s demand for locally sourced wood creates incentives for landowners to keep forests as forests. Our collaboration with landowners and other partners promotes the benefits of sustainable forest management and third-party certification, which provides an additional level of assurance of responsible forest management.

We have continued to meet 34 percent of its fiber needs with certified wood, including 19 percent from Forest Stewardship Council® (FSC®)-certified sources, even as overall FSC acres have declined in the United States.

Domtar's 2017 Sustainability Report, “Working Smart for the Long Term,” was prepared in accordance with the “core option” of the Global Reporting Initiative’s (GRI) G4 Sustainability Reporting Guidelines. This framework encourages companies to thoughtfully focus their sustainability reports on the issues that matter most to their customers, employees, shareholders and other stakeholders.

Making products for which there is growing demand, leveraging our access to renewable wood fiber, repurposing our assets for biorefining, and turning byproducts into new revenue streams have become central to Domtar’s plan for long term sustainable growth.

Find more information on the company's sustainability practices, including the full report, here.

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Domtar’s 2017 Sustainability Report details the company’s endeavor to take a longer term view of creating and preserving value for our shareholders, customers, employees and communities.  For more inspiring stories  about Domtar's sustainability efforts, visit the Domtar Newsroom at https://newsroom.domtar.com. To view the full 2017 Sustainability Report click here.