Textured Jersey first to publish GHG report

Vishmi Wijeratne in Avissawella

Textured Jersey PLC (TJ), announced that they had become the first company to publish a Green House Gas (GHG) emission report in compliance with ISO 14064-1 standard for the financial year 2011-2012.

Renuka Gunawardana

Textured Jersey factory

The Chemical and Process Engineer, Renuka Gunawardana, said that the apparel industry was one of the worst polluters. "By being able to publish this report, we have showed our commitment to the environment," she said.

According to a senior official of Somaratne Consultants (Pvt) Ltd., who were behind the process of collecting data regarding emissions to be presented to the British Standards Institute that presented TJ with the GHG certificate, said that for a certificate of this sort to be published, the Green House Gas emission should be below 5%. "The total Green House Gas emission of TJ for the period April 1, 2011 to March 31, 2012, had been 42,438 tons of carbon dioxide, equivalent to GHG," Gunawardene said.

He further said that this certificate had been designed to be used in the process of moving towards improved GHG performance. The report according to Somaratne, would ensure that the organizational GHG performance to customers and potential customers would be communicated, while communicating organizational resolve in GHG performance improvements to society.

"The report would be produced every year, covering the period ending March 31. The investment towards obtaining the certification was around Rs. 1.8 million. We hope to reduce GHG emissions through the reduced usage of electricity and steam generation," Gunawardene said.

Business Development Manager, Samadhi Wijekoon, said that in the process of gaining carbon neutrality, they hoped to quantify GHG emissions attributable to its value addition, reduce GHG emissions and offset unavoidable emissions.

"By unavoidable emissions, we mean a cost benefit analysis and we are bound to have cost efficiency through efforts to reduce GHG emissions, we hope to provide this to our customers in terms of discounts. We will be able to cover the initial investment we laid on this project by one year's time," Wijekoon said.