Smurfit Kappa - Circular economy

Smurfit Kappa is a frontrunner in recycling. The company’s core business is manufacturing corrugated packaging that is largely made of recycled material. The company has a strong fit with our Circular Economy transition theme. Smurfit Kappa supplies containerboards, corrugated containers, and other paper-based packaging products. Smurfit Kappa Group has around 370 production sites across 36 countries worldwide. The Irish company is the largest manufacturer of corrugated boxes in Europe.

The company is part of the portfolio of Triodos Global Equity Impact Fund and fits our Circular Economy transition theme.

Impact investment rationale

  • Smurfit Kappa aims to replace the natural resources it uses in production, reuse materials wherever possible and involve stakeholders as the company develops a closed loop system.
  • Recovered fibres from recycled paper and cardboard are a major raw material for the company’s paper mills and packaging plants; 75% of the raw material used by Smurfit Kappa is recycled fibre.
  • The company’s packaging can be recycled 6-8 times, and once the fibres are depleted it is typically used for energy generation or in agriculture. Furthermore, with its exposure to the rapid growth in ecommerce demand, Smurfit Kappa has a strong focus to further reduce void space.
  • Smurfit Kappa wants to decrease the waste sent to landfill by 30% per tonne of product produced by its mills by 2025

Smurfit Kappacontributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals:

SolarEdge – Renewable resources

Headquartered in California, SolarEdge Technologies is a clean energy pioneer. The company provides solar power harvesting and monitoring solutions for residential, commercial and utility-scale solar photovoltaic (PV) solutions. SolarEdge has invented an intelligent inverter solution that has changed the way power is harvested and managed in a solar photovoltaic (PV) system. This is vital for the transition from traditional fossil fuel energy to clean and renewable energy. Supporting increased PV proliferation, the SolarEdge system consists of power optimisers, inverters, communication and smart energy management solutions, and a cloud-based monitoring platform.

SolarEdge offers a solution that contributes to a zero-carbon energy system. The company therefore fits our Renewable Resources transition theme. The company is part of the portfolio of Triodos Pioneer Impact Fund.

Impact investment rationale

  • The SolarEdge DC optimised inverter system maximises power generation at an individual PV module level while lowering the cost of energy produced by the solar PV system.
  • Shading is a big concern for traditional string inverters, as the energy output of the weakest performing panel determines the output of the entire system. SolarEdge has developed a technology that allows each panel to produce energy independently. So-called power optimisers improve panel efficiency and mitigate the loss from shading and aging of the panels.
  • SolarEdge also recently entered the EV market, encouraging sustainable mobility for the future. In addition, they moved into lithium batteries, a battery type with relatively little impact on the environment as it needs fewer raw materials, is efficient and has a long life.

SolarEdge contributes to the following UN Sustainable Development Goals:

Download our whitepaper A call for radical transformation to learn more about our seven transition themes.

Explore our Impact Equities and Bonds impact report ‘Moving the needle’ to find out more about our role as impact investor. The report presents our 2019 results in a context of numbers and stories and showcases our mission to make money work for positive change.