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Environmental analysis & action |
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 The analysis
Cryostar used environmental analysis, a structured tool to assess the company’s impact . The different steps in this approach are:
Step 1: Cryostar Identifies environmental aspects according to environmental themes corresponding to incoming/outgoing flows.
Step 2: Cryostar evaluates impacts according to scoring grids adapted to the specific features of environmental themes, taking account of awareness of the external environment, respect for regulations and the levels generated by Cryostar.
Step 3: Cryostar ranks the environmental aspects to determine significant environmental aspects.
Step 4: Cryostar identifies impact sources and contributory activities.
Step 5: Cryostar carries out the environmental analysis, defining its objectives and targets.
The analysis
The 2008 analysis identified the following significant impacts:
Raw materials: in its activities, Cryostar mainly uses paper (Engineering activity) and liquid nitrogen (machine test activity).
Main impact: direct or indirect exhaustion of a natural resource.
Energy: Cryostar’s two main energy sources are electricity and gas. 80% of the electricity used is used for tests on assembled machines, whilst 100% of the gas is used for heating.
Main impact: direct exhaustion of a natural resource as well as impacts related to energy production and use.
Water: following the introduction of closed circuit cooling systems, Cryostar has been able to optimise its water consumption. A few years ago, test activity represented 91% of site consumption; today it only represents 50%.
Main impact: exhaustion of natural resources
Atmospheric emissions: the atmospheric emissions related to Cryostar’s activities are due to boiler discharge only.
Cryostar wanted to take a more global approach to its impact, based on the ADEME’s Carbon Balance method. The criteria taken into account in this approach are:
 Goods transport.
Professional travel.
Home-workplace journeys.
Energy consumption.
Waste processing.
Cryostar’s activities are predominantly international, mainly outside the European Union; the company’s carbon footprint is greatly affected by our international transport and travel.
Main impact: greenhouse gas contribution
Noise: Noise is inherent to our test activities. This is the reason behind Cryostar’s considerable investment in this area over the last few years. The latest investment, at the start of 2009, enabled us to drastically reduce the average noise level (level C, after inspection by an approved body).
Main impact: noise annoyance.
Waste: Cryostar’s activities mainly generate traditional office waste, waste related to packaging and, to a lesser extent, waste related to the machine assembly and test activity. The important point is the waste recovery rate. This is currently close to 80% following the introduction of our "environmental approach".
Main impact: exhaustion of natural resources and impact related to waste processing.
Cryostar is gradually implementing solutions to these impacts, and will continue to audit and modify its action plan on an annual basis. Details of action Cryostar is taking now can be found here. |
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