Water and Waste
Water and Waste
At CSL, we recognise that responsible management and efficient use of natural resources is key to our sustainable growth and our ability to enable efficient and reliable supply of our life-saving medicines.
Water
Water is a precious and limited resource, that is why it is one of CSL’s environmental focus areas. CSL’s focus on water is to identify, prioritise and implement water reduction initiatives.
That is why CSL has set a target by 2030 to achieve zero percent absolute growth in water use, against FY2021 baseline, at three priority manufacturing sites, Kankakee (US), Broadmeadows and Tullamarine (Australia). These three sites are located in regions forecast to be water stressed by 2030.
To ensure CSL conserves water in water stressed regions where the company operates, CSL will utilise the following levers to meet our 2030 ambitions:
- Capture and reuse clean wastewater.
- Optimise large-scale cleaning processes.
- Treat and reuse wastewater.
Waste
CSL’s objective and one of our strategic focus areas is to divert waste from landfill, reduce the amount of waste that is generated throughout the production and use of all products. We aim to do this through reducing, reusing, composting, recycling waste as far as possible and to dispose of the residual waste responsibly.
To demonstrate CSL’s commitment to reducing waste, by 2030, CSL aims to:
- Divert more than 90% of manufacturing waste from landfill i.e., 'Zero Waste’ at all manufacturing sites.
- Reduce percentage of waste to landfill year on year for CSL’s Plasma collection centres.
- Minimise percentage waste incinerated (if site is already zero waste).
To achieve our 2030 ambitions, CSL will:
- Reduce absolute waste by adapting process and purchasing decisions;
- Improve recycling and reuse through improved segregation and identification of novel waste disposal pathways; and
- Improve composting of organic materials through improved segregation.
The amount of waste produced and how it is handled varies between CSL’s different facilities according to production processes and available disposal options.
A large part of the waste stream is made up of glass, plastics, cardboard, wooden pallets and other types of packaging, which is necessary for ensuring product safety of pharmaceuticals. Disposal of packaging presents particular challenges for pharmaceutical companies because packaging such as single-use plastics, glass syringes and vials are not recyclable and must be disposed of in a safe manner.
CSL’s operations in Europe dispose of almost all waste by recycling or incineration. In Australia, CSL is a signatory to the Australian Packaging Covenant and reports regularly on plans and progress to minimise waste. There is also a wide variety of waste recycling programs at our US facilities. However, more can be done to reduce waste to landfill across our Australian and US operations and this remains a focus area for CSL in the near term.
CSL continues to identify and implement methods to reduce the amount of materials used for the packaging and distribution of its products, including:
- Establishing a dedicated, Packaging Innovation function, who is dedicated to evaluating and planning the introduction of sustainable materials.
- Prescribing the use of sustainable materials in packaging development and reducing the size of packaging when existing packaging is adapted;
- Progressing towards electronic leaflets with the Australian Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) approving electronic product information leaflets (ePIL), from September 2023 for many boxed injectables for use by Australian health care professionals, where a history of safe use has been demonstrated; and
- Progressively remove leaflets from products where applicable.
- Paper patient information leaflets have now been completely removed for our Behring products on the Japanese market. The leaflet removal will now continue for other markets and products from the whole of the CSL organisation.
