Green energy and its use in Alier

The increasingly high consumption of energy worldwide and the continuity of fossil fuels generate worrying environmental impacts for human development in the coming years. This is when the use of renewable energy and increased energy efficiency are some of the solutions to combat this problem.

At Alier, it is our desire to stand out in caring for the environment through the use of cutting-edge technologies and solutions that do not harm our planet. One of them is the use of green energy, that which comes from renewable sources and natural resources, luckily, inexhaustible.

The use of green energy is a priority

That is why the green energy solutions existing in the market are our objective and we put into practice all possible ones in order to stand out in this regard.

With the enormous energy crisis that we are suffering, due to which there is even talk of a global blackout, it is necessary to take maximum care of the available resources. Why not use green energy? In Alier we are in favor of it.

There is no doubt that decarbonization and circularity are attributes of the 21st century on which environmental and economic efficiency depend. And in this sense, the Next Generation funds, of which Alier has obtained three million euros in 2022, are intended for projects marked on this same path and we hope to achieve many other objectives in the following years.
Some of the achievements we have achieved in relation to resource optimization are:
• In 2020 and together with Atlas, we promoted a pioneering plant to obtain hydrogen from water and use it as fuel. This project also includes a 6 MW photovoltaic plant.
• This year we have been awarded three million euros from the Next Generation funds to promote a project that will allow us to save between 30% and 40% of water in paper manufacturing.
• In the coming months there is a project to install photovoltaic panels on the roofs of the Rosselló plant, in addition to a solar garden.
And as we mentioned, there are many other projects underway. At Alier we are very committed to sustainability, and we are aware that if we advance in the high rates of paper recycling, but fall behind in poor resource management, we will not achieve anything. Therefore, we strive every day to continue being a leading company in this field.

Elisabet Alier, president of Alier and ASPAPEL (Spanish Association of Pulp, Paper and Cardboard Manufacturers) assures that the main objective of the paper sector “is to promote the transformation of the Spanish paper chain into an international benchmark for the circular and decarbonized industry. And for this we propose an investment plan for the next three years with 1,400 million euros and 180 projects of fifty companies”.
In terms of decarbonisation, our goal is to replace gas and fossil fuels with renewable fuels and green hydrogen, incorporate biogas and hydrogen as fuels to obtain thermal energy and also obtain electricity through renewable sources such as photovoltaics, biomass or renewable waste. As we have mentioned, the achievements already obtained go down that route and that is where we continue to go.

The paper sector is struggling to get the Government to offer more aid and lower costs related to the use of renewable energies in order to implement them 100% in our productions. Elisabet Alier is a great defender of this matter, and from different media outlets she has appealed to those who have power in this regard:
“It is urgent to provide certainty, predictability and a competitive energy cost environment to our industry that facilitates the energy transition and clears the path to decarbonization. What is not working must be reformed: urgent action is needed at the EU level to overcome this situation. And it is not only the future of the industry, but the economic recovery and the transformation of our economy that we are playing for”.
In the same way, the commitment to caring for the environment, curbing climate change and preserving the few natural resources that remain, has motivated our company to do everything possible to use renewable energy in our productions. And not only that, but our president fights daily to achieve a generalized change in this regard for the more than 48 companies in the paper sector that are part of ASPAPEL.
And we will continue doing that, for being different, for creating a different world and for leaving a better world for the following generations.