H11. Water

Essity’s Group target for water is that the company’s tissue operations will improve water quality by reducing the level of suspended solids and organic content (BOD), and to reduce the quantity of discharged water by 10% by 2020, with 2014 as reference year.

In 2020, levels of suspended solids decreased 26.9% (25.8; 18.5), the amount of organic content (BOD) by 21.0% (28.5; 25.0) and the quantity of discharged water by 3.5% (1.9; 2.9) compared with 2014. Essity’s main focus has been to improve water quality during these years. In 2021, Essity will draw up new targets for the company’s water management.

Extraction, use and discharge of water

Essity’s reporting of water extraction states totals for surface water, groundwater and municipal water systems. Surface water, which represents the largest share of water extraction, as a general rule must be purified from dissolved and solid content before use in the production process. Most of Essity’s water is used to transport fibers during production processes. The remainder is mainly used as cooling water. In 2020, 73% (74; 75) of the water used was drawn from surface sources. Essity’s water discharge is divided into cooling water and process water. Cooling water has simply been heated and is not contaminated in any way. Process water is treated using mechanical and biological treatment systems before it is discharged.

In 2020, six of Essity’s wholly owned production facilities were located in so-called water-stressed areas. The sites accounted for 7% of Essity’s total water consumption, distributed between 37% from surface sources, 37% from groundwater and the remainder from recycled water from municipal water systems. Total water extraction from these facilities in 2020 was 6.9 million m³, water discharges 4.4 million m³ and water consumption 2.5 million m^3..

Any environmental incidents are registered in a central incident-reporting system. In 2020, a small number of incidents relating to temporary exceedances of permitted limit values for waste water were registered. No incident was of such a magnitude that it posed a threat to an emissions permit.

Read more about how Essity works with water in the chapter More from less and Circularity.

Breakdown of water extraction 2020

Breakdown of discharged water 2020