Sustainable Working Environments in Tomorrow’s World

Written by

Wilkhahn

09 October 2022

•

3 min read

Wilkhahn’s more than just its furniture. The company’s considered a pioneer worldwide when it comes to people friendly and green offices. It anticipated global trends on issues like sustainability, agile collaboration and health early on.

One of the biggest challenges of our age is to ensure the world’s a place still worth living in for us and subsequent generations. We all need to ensure our lifestyles are as climate neutral as possible. As a 1996 winner of a German ecological prize, sustainability has been at the heart of Wilkhahn’s business for decades. We believe that commercial success is always connected with social and ecological responsibility. Our timeless products are superbly crafted to ensure they last and last. They also enable simple repairs that extend their useful lives even further. Once the furniture’s reached the end of its life, some of the high-quality materials can even be recycled. This capability is our antidote to the throw-away society.

However, sustainability means a lot more to us than just producing first-class office furniture out of recyclable materials. We want to forge ahead with making the whole production process more resource efficient. We’re pursuing two strategies to ensure production processes are as climate friendly as possible. We’re increasing the use of green energy and constantly boosting efficiency to reduce energy consumption.

Renewable energy accounts for 54 percent of the mix

In 2021, despite higher productivity, we provided 3,875 megawatt hours of renewable energy in terms of our demand at Wilkhahn’s headquarters for the first time. This figure translates to a rise of 54 percent. We achieved this improvement by switching to green, hydroelectric power. And this year, two of every three kilowatt hours of energy are to be generated in a climate-neutral manner.

The company’s relative energy consumption compared with growth is also continuing to drop. In 2021, we achieved our goal of cutting this figure at headquarters by at least 10 percent compared with 2019. By switching to LED lighting in some of the sheds and replacing compressors with new, more efficient ones, absolute electricity consumption even decreased by 15 percent in this period.

To improve how we use feedstock, we choose durable, low-pollutant materials, reduce offcuts and pursue low-waste production.

Cutting carbon emissions, preventing waste and recycling consistently

We cut carbon dioxide emissions from the vehicle fleet by 11 percent and required one seventh less packaging made of wood, cardboard and plastic. In 2021, the waste from production lines and offices was cut by 10 percent compared with the previous year, even though production and the quantity of waste had risen. What’s more, 93 percent of production and office waste was recycled or used for thermal recovery.

In 2021, the increase in production led to a rise in the materials used and water consumption. The feedstock required also rose by 5 percent to 2,584 tonnes and water consumption by 12 percent compared with the previous year. We’ll continue to strive to save even more resources in these areas.

Launched in 2021, the new Yonda (by neunzig°design) is an attractive shell-structure chair range where state-of-the-art design and exceptional comfort are based on a construction and materials that are ideal for a circular economy. All of which whets our appetite for a sustainable future.

Protecting the planet means less is more

To ensure we’re greener throughout the company in future, we’re constantly working on tweaks and investing in new equipment, such as the multi-boiler control system for our biogas district heating and a bigger heat exchanger to control heat more efficiently.

We’re continuing to develop ideas for our Sustainability Action Plan across all areas of the company. The plan covers the design and development process to improvements in climate protection, energy and material efficiency and boosting the health and well-being of everyone concerned.

Nowadays, the modernist principle that less is more seems more relevant than ever. It concerns our products’ underlying design ethos and resource consumption in all the company’s processes. At Wilkhahn, we do everything to achieve this goal and provide the resulting added value.

At ArchiPro we recognise and acknowledge the existing, original and ancient connection Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples have to the lands and waterways across the Australian continent. We pay our respects to the elders past and present. We commit to working together to build a prosperous and inclusive Australia.