What already makes us “green”?
Electric arc furnace
By investing in the electric arc furnace for melting our steels many years ago, we have already taken a major step towards sustainability.
Our products are produced on a scrap basis and require much less primary raw materials compared to the blast furnace route. The CO2 footprint is significantly lower on our production route than in blast furnace production.
Scrap addition
We use high-quality scrap in the production of our steels. Some of this scrap results from our own finishing processes, i.e. forging and rolling, sawing and bending, as well as machining operations. The other part is covered by purchases. We differentiate between more than 100 scrap groups in order to take the alloy elements contained in the scrap into account as far as possible during melting. Thus we reduce the use of primary alloys.
With an annual scrap demand of more than 300,000 t and a recycling rate of around 90%, we are one of the major scrap recyclers in Germany.
Eulingsberg landfill site
For more than 60 years, Buderus Edelstahl has operated a landfill site on the neighbouring Eulingsberg. Slag components that cannot be reused any further are deposited there.The area designated for use enables us to secure disposal well into the second half of the 21st century.
With a total area of about 40 hectares, 6.5 hectares are designated as compensation areas where rows of trees and various hedges are planted. In addition, orchards have been planted there, for example for regional apple varieties, including three Hessian Local Varieties of the Year.
To maintain the green spaces, the already renatured areas of the landfill are grazed by about 60 sheep and goats.
Furthermore, four bee colonies live there, which are kept by a professional beekeeper and produce excellent blossom honey.
The lizard in our B|E green logo
As explained before, we have a special connection to lizards, because we still find these animals at our Eulingsberg landfill site.
The landfill is also a habitat for a variety of wildlife, including protected species such as the sand lizard known from our logo.
We have been protecting the existing population there for years as part of our landfill expansion project by having them captured before construction works begin. The lizards are then transferred to appropriately protected habitats so that they can be released again once the construction works are completed.
That is the reason why the lizard became part of our B|E green logo and a symbol for Buderus Edelstahl’s ecological change.