Alcantara, a small Italian manufacturer, is touting a rare achievement: carbon neutrality, meaning a zero carbon footprint.
Alcantara is a luxury materials supplier for auto and other industries. Some of its products are used for interiors of luxury automobiles.
CEO Andrea Boragno says the company lowered its own emissions by nearly half, through projects that include a highly efficient co-generation steam electricity plant, and waste recovery to produce fertilizers for forests.
The manufacturer then invested in carbon-reducing projects to offset the rest of its emissions. The company's carbon neutrality certification was issued by a third party, TÜV SÜD.
True zero emissions from manufacturing, says Boragno, "is not possible. We can work on it. We can improve."
Boragno says some of what his company did can be duplicated, but not all of it. But, "if everybody would do like this, we would have a better world for sure."
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