Outstanding stewardship in Germany

I recently had the opportunity to visit with my friends and longtime suppliers at Papierfabrik Schoellershammer of Duren, Germany. I first visited Schoellershammer back in 1989 when I founded CTI Paper Group.

Many things about this unique company were interesting from my first meeting and continue to be interesting now 20 years later. The company was founded in 1784 by the Schoeller family which is still managing the company today. I think it is now the 7th generation of the family involved in the business.

As has become a tradition of old friends I had the pleasure of having a dinner in a medieval castle with the current elder of the family Heinrich August Schoeller. Mr. Schoeller is a charming gentleman with a nice sense of humor and more energy than I have today at age 50.

The picture above is of the paper mill's power plant and of it's recycling fiber it stores in the mill's yard. I forget the exact tonnage numbers but the Schoellershammer paper mill recycles something around 500 metric tons of cardboard boxes per day. The mill uses this recovered fiber to produce a 100% post consumer waste liner material for the manufacture of corrugated boxes.

The mill has several eco initiatives that are significant. One is it's water cleaning plant. The mill returns the water it takes from the Rur river (a small trout river) cleaner than when it took it, in almost drinking water quality. Lastly perhaps the most impressive initiative is it's power plant shown below. The plant burns coal taken from local mines and burns it in a clean manner. In fact the mill exceeds the local clean air ordinances by almost twice the required cleansing of emissions. As proof of these efforts you can stand by the power plant and look up at the chimeny which emits not smoke!! Here's a photo of the power plant at full tilt, producing most of the energy used by the mill without producing any visible smoke. Truly amazing.