European Week for Waste Reduction
European Week for Waste Reduction (EWWR), which finishes on 28 November 2021, is a chance for GRTgaz to focus on its waste reduction actions and its recent partnerships aimed at protecting the environment.
The EWWR was launched in France in 2006 by the French Agency for Ecological Transition (ADEME). It aims to raise people’s awareness about the need to reduce their waste.
There are three main goals:
- save raw materials,
- limit the impact of human activities on the environment,
- reduce the cost of waste for the community.
There are many ways of bettering our waste-related actions, affecting all members of society: from improving production methods, to more sensible consumption, to preventing dangerous waste. As for last year, GRTgaz was a supporter of the event.
Reducing waste: an ongoing concern for GRTgaz
This is a long-standing priority issue for GRTgaz, which already has a waste recovery rate of 98% (source: GRTgaz Non-financial Declaration of Performance 2020 - DPEF). The company’s CAP24 business plan is mainly geared towards the energy transition, with the target of transported gas being carbon neutral by 2050. GRTgaz actively supports the development of new methods of producing renewable gas (anaerobic digestion, pyrogasification, hydrothermal gasification, methanation and hydrogen).
Renewable gas: a promising energy source
These low-carbon gases are produced from waste and materials from many sectors including agriculture, the agri-food industry, mass catering and local authorities via the collection of household waste, green waste and sewage sludge. They limit waste while contributing to the emergence of a circular economy and generating local value. GRTgaz fosters close ties with organisations working in this area, among which France Nature Environnement, a French federation with 900,000 members bringing together 6,000 environmental protection associations.
Publications
Pooling expertise to speed up progress
GRTgaz and FNE believe strongly that dialogue and expertise sharing are the best ways of improving practices. In June 2021, they signed a national partnership agreement to work towards meeting energy transition goals, a key part of which is support for developing new renewable gases. The two partners have already come up with a decision-making tool for anaerobic digestion projects, and are now working on pyrogasification.
>> Presentation of the partnership between GRTgaz and France Nature Environnement
We are all future “Custodians of Nature”
Preserving biodiversity is another of GRTgaz’s core commitments. After signing a local partnership agreement with FNE Ile-de-France in June 2021, GRTgaz's Val de Seine regional delegation is committed to raising its employees' awareness of the “Sentinelle de la Nature” (“Custodians of Nature”) initiative. This digital platform launched by FNE notifies regional third-sector organisations about dangers to the natural environment or, conversely, informs them of any noteworthy initiatives. Some GRTgaz employees travel extensively throughout the regions, and are in this sense ready-made “Custodians of Nature”.
