One of the things about B&B that makes me really respect the company was their culture of sustainability. I was talking with our plant manager, Brian DiMattio, about what makes our company “environmentally friendly,” and his answer excited me. Over the years I’ve read many books and articles about corporations and organizations “greenwashing” their image to entice customers to continue buying their products and services. This resulted in my becoming a cynic of environmental sustainability and standards within the business world. Upon hearing of one particular practice that we adhere to strictly, I realized that B&B was not in the greenwasher category.
All of our ink is 100% recycled and made into fuel.
All of the ink waste is collected in drums and taken to Giant Resource Recovery (GRR), in Sumter, SC. From there, the waste drums are opened up and mixed with similar wastes for fuels blending. It’s bulked up into storage tanks and when needed, it’s taken to their sister site, GRR in Harleyville, SC. GRR in Harleyville is a cement kiln, and the waste is used as fuel to fire up the kilns and make cement.
How cool is that? The ink that doesn’t make it onto printed paper is used to fuel massive kilns that make cement!
There is always so much talk about paper recycling, so it’s nice to see that B&B considers all our consumables for recycling.
By +Maggie Young