A highly inspirational update of environmental initiatives by Cornwall’s largest employer Imerys. Visionary people who are challenging a global minerals industry to raise standards by Restoring, rewilding, regenerating & reforesting.
Imerys is a significant player in Cornwall’s landscape, extracting and processing around a million tonnes of kaolin a year from pits originally exploited 250 years ago. It produces critical minerals for the energy transition and its Cornish kaolin is used in sustainable paints, coatings, building products, life sciences and natural solutions for contaminated land such as natural filtration solutions.
Barren land has been replaced by trees in their hundreds of thousands, wildflowers and grasses are being encouraged back at great expense and so, even as a new era of Lithium extraction begins on the old sites, new forests and heathlands will eventually take over much of brownfield 'clay country' - a tremendous legacy for the region.
Some of the initiatives highlighted by Imerys at the event:
🌳 2 million trees planted with plans to plant hundreds of thousands more.
☀ Switching from fossil fuels to solar, wind and small hydro to power operations. Globally, there is a 42% reduction target for scope 1&2 Greenhouse gas emissions, switching from fossil fuels to biomass and electricals
🌻 Restored more than 900 hectares of heathland - one of the biggest heathland restoration projects in England.
🌼 Soil Remediation to restore former mining sites. This involves reshaping the land, improving soil quality, and replanting native vegetation to promote biodiversity and create new habitats for wildlife.
🦋 Eco-Balance Sites: areas of reclaimed land designed to enhance biodiversity.
🚿 Water Management: recycling water within its processing plants and ensuring that discharged water meets environmental standards.
🚶♀️ Maintains more than 40km of permissive pathways
🥜 Away from Cornwall, Imerys is using peanut shells to fuel kilns in USA – just one example of the use of agricultural bi-products for biomass energy.
The company is a partner in British Lithium, who will extract and process lithium from old, brownfield minerals sites in Cornwall. It is part of the larger Imerys group, a French multi-national.
Cornwall is committed to carbon neutrality and is setting a national pace in response to the climate crisis: planning and building for a sustainable future.
The region is a geological powerhouse with a unique mineral endowment - The Power of Cornwall, https://lnkd.in/gpa4AdJd explains how the region’s geology presents unique opportunities for the region.
#powerofcornwall #lithium #biodiversity #regeneration #rewild #soilrestoration #cornwallbusiness #sustainability #ESG
New ‘Business Breakfast’ Series Boosts Cornwall’s Geo-Resources Sector
A new series of monthly 'Business Breakfast' sessions, hosted by geo-resources businesses across Cornwall, is rapidly gaining popularity and generating considerable interest in the geo-resources sector. Co-ordinated by the Cornwall Mining Alliance and the Geo-Resources Cluster Project team, these events are becoming a staple for industry professionals eager to network, collaborate, and build relationships.
Building on the success of inaugural session, held in June at Wardell Armstrong International (which focused on 'The Mining Life Cycle'), today we met at Imerys to learn about their "Sustainagility" programme. This masterclass delved into Imerys' commitment to sustainability, addressing the increasing demands for transparency and better environmental practice.
Check this space for the future sessions.
#UKSPF #CIOSGOODGROWTH #LevellingUp #GoodGrowth
Dissemination and Communication manager
1wGreat opportunity