Circular Economy Circular Economy

All of Mars' Chocolate Facilities are Now Certified Landfill-Free

Mars Chocolate North America announced last week that all 10 of its manufacturing facilities are now certified landfill-free, a significant step towards achieving Mars’ company-wide goal of zero-waste-to-landfill by 2015. The Henderson, Nevada site was the tenth and final chocolate manufacturing facility to achieve this milestone.Since announcing this goal in 2007, Mars has reached an overall reduction of approximately 4,500 tonnes of waste each year. To do so, Mars zeroed in on three key focus areas: efficient operating processes, recycling programs for multiple waste streams, and mutually beneficial partnerships with disposal vendors and local farm reuse programs.

By Caitlin Kauffman | Published 10 years ago | About a 2 minute read

Mars Chocolate North America announced last week that all 10 of its manufacturing facilities are now certified landfill-free, a significant step towards achieving Mars’ company-wide goal of zero-waste-to-landfill by 2015. The Henderson, Nevada site was the tenth and final chocolate manufacturing facility to achieve this milestone.

Since announcing this goal in 2007, Mars has reached an overall reduction of approximately 4,500 tonnes of waste each year. To do so, Mars zeroed in on three key focus areas: efficient operating processes, recycling programs for multiple waste streams, and mutually beneficial partnerships with disposal vendors and local farm reuse programs.

Mars recently published its Principles in Action Summary, the fourth annual report detailing the company’s approach to business and its commitment to put the Mars Five Principles into action. This includes a target to eliminate all fossil fuel energy use and greenhouse gas emissions from its direct operations by 2040.

“At Mars we are constantly focused on bettering the local communities in which we operate,” said Mike Wittman, VP of Supply Chain at Mars Chocolate North America. “We are proud to have earned zero-waste-to-landfill certification, another important achievement in driving sustainability across all of our facilities and continuing to sweeten the world in which we live and work.”

Additionally, Mars has worked to achieve LEED Gold certifications for all new major buildings globally since 2011, resulting in ten certified building so far. The company also plans to create a 200-megawatt wind farm that will generate electricity equivalent to 100 percent of the power for Mars’ U.S. operations, powering 70 sites, including 37 factories and 25,000 associates. They also hope to partner with warehouses and regional distribution centers to adopt similar waste reduction policies.

In other zero-waste-to-landfill news, last month Unilever announced it had achieved zero non-hazardous waste to landfill across its global factory network, eliminating over €200m in costs and creating hundreds of jobs. Similarly, P&G announced in December it had reduced its manufacturing waste to landfill to less than 0.4 percent of input materials, six years ahead of its 2020 goal. P&G said this milestone alone created almost $2 billion in value.