Each of our employees takes care of Lindström’s impacts on the environment. At our laundries, the textile care workers make dozens of decisions that affect the consumption of energy and water when choosing a suitable washing programme for textiles. In the same way, we are constantly making decisions that have an effect on the amount of textile waste and the quality of our products.
The most significant environmental impact in our business operation comes from the laundry process. This process consumes energy, water, and detergents. In addition, emissions are created when transporting textiles from customers to the laundry and back. Most of the energy used in the laundry is used to heat up the washing water and to finish the textiles. We are constantly working on the development of energy efficiency. Heat recovery from the waste water and the air from the dryers improves our energy efficiency significantly and thus we have installed heat recovery systems for many of our laundries.
The product to be washed and its degree of dirtiness affect both the amount of water required and the quality of the wastewater produced. We always aim for efficient water use by recycling water at various washing phases. Rinse water can be used as a washing water for the next batch. In rinsing, we always use clean water.
The cleanest wastewater is generated by the washing of hotel textiles and the dirtiest by the washing of mats and industrial wipers. If we cannot direct the wastewater to the local wastewater treatment plant, we will deal with the water in our own wastewater treatment plant before putting it into drainage.
‘Changes in the distribution of our products, such as the increased amount of industrial wipers in washing, affect our water consumption. Therefore, our aim to keep up with previous years’ consumption levels per kilo of textiles washed is a challenging goal for us, and we are doing a lot of work to make it happen,‘ Sini Rajala, responsible for environmental issues, says.