April 26, 2023 Sustainable Partnerships

The flexible PU foam industry is bolstering its green credentials. Industry leaders are placing ESG at the forefront of their strategic growth plans.

By Natalie Watson, Head of Sustainability at The Vita Group

The flexible PU foam industry is bolstering its green credentials. Pioneering industry leaders are taking note of ESG and placing it at the forefront of their strategic growth plans.

At The Vita Group, we have recognised the need to prioritise sustainability. And now are not content with simply transforming our own processes – and have set out to drive circularity throughout the supply chain and the wider industry. The success of our approach is all down to building strong, sustainable partnerships and there has never been greater impetus to do so.

The urgent need to focus on sustainability was starkly communicated in a recent climate change report from the UN, which was described as nothing less than ‘a code red for humanity.’

According to the report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) the climate can be stabilised, but this will ‘require strong, rapid, and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions, and reaching net zero CO2 emissions’ in order to avert disaster.

For everyone at The Vita Group, a company that has been a leading provider of value-added and differentiated flexible polyurethane foam products for over 70 years, achieving this mission means working in partnership with others. When tackled in small parts by governments, organisations and individuals, carbon reduction becomes more attainable.

Our vision is to be the commercialised partner of choice for customers focused on high-quality, sustainable uses of foam. A shared commitment to nurturing circular economies, where products are recycled and reused for as long as possible, limiting waste and creating mutual value, is vital. This is underpinned by cutting-edge material science, delivered by The Vita Group’s specialist chemists and application engineers, and through sustainable production.

When we collaborate with suppliers, customers, and partners on new products, processes, and material science initiatives, we seek to accelerate change at every level of the industry – including regulatory policy.

Our partnerships are focused on a regenerative mindset – we’re not just looking at reducing impact but at how we can make things radically better. The flexible PU foam industry has an important role to play in minimising impact on the environment. This is due in large part to the fact that flexible PU foam is highly applicable to a wide range of applications – and that as a material it is more sustainable in the ways it is manufactured, moved and recycled.

Thanks to flexible PU foam’s inherent environmental advantages and the creative ways in which we know we can push the sustainable envelope, it’s highly apparent that flexible PU foam is a true enabler of a net zero economy.

But being an inherently green material in the first place isn’t enough and we know that there isn’t just one ‘silver bullet’ solution to achieving a lower carbon economy. Instead, it’s going to require multiple technologies, ideas, processes and partners working in combination.

In practice, The Vita Group’s sustainable partnership approach is multi-layered and stable, linking up with customers, suppliers, academia and legislators. And its ambitions are strategically linked to global climate change endeavours.

Partnership work has resulted in some remarkably innovative new processes – this is most evident in collaborations with suppliers.

Partnering with suppliers

To foster deep, permanent change within the PU foam industry, The Vita Group collaborates closely with suppliers, so that, together, they can improve the recycling of existing resources and reduce the amount of virgin hydrocarbons used in the creation of PU mattress foam. Thanks to its strong track record in sustainably driven innovations in manufacturing and product design, The Vita Group can position itself as a hub of transformation and an enabler of the circular economy.

We are committed to providing the supply chain with the sustainable options they need and reducing the industry’s dependence on environmentally harmful raw materials and processes.

Indeed, whenever they develop a new product, they build a sustainable element into its design. In practice this has ranged from replacing petrochemically derived raw materials with sustainable bio-polyols, feeding trim material back into its processes and reducing the weight of products to streamline logistics and make further emissions savings.

The partnership fostered with our providers, combines their expertise in complex chemistry with The Vita Group’s ability to harness this science in the creation of advanced products. In 2021, this united approach led to the commercialisation of The Vita Group’s high-quality Orbis™ foam range.

Collaborating with other experts within the supply chain is just one way that The Vita Group is building sustainability into its range of polyurethane foam and Talalay latex products. By 2030, the company is focused on creating a sustainably sourced option for half of its product range.

Partnering with customers

The Vita Group’s approach is to engender both internal and external circular economies, creating a solid loop between customers, manufacturers, and suppliers. We have a unique opportunity to help customers reduce their environmental impact, not only through low-carbon designs for foam products utilising rebonded and alternative polyols, but in the repurposing of their trim, or waste.

We buy back approximately 8-12,000 tonnes of customer waste every year to help create rebonded products. Customers rely on us to demonstrate sustainable values in action. They are acutely alert to the long-standing association between used mattresses and environmentally damaging landfill waste. By collaborating with customers, as well as suppliers, we are forming a solid base to move our entire industry into a sustainable product and boosting consumer perceptions.

Our work on advancing the sector’s circularity has seen it inject a new lease of life into existing foam by turning it into underlay flooring solutions through our flooring division. The material has also been used as Shockpad underlay for artificial sports pitches via The Vita Group’s Revosport team.

Taking innovation even further, The Vita Group scientists have explored how to recycle PU foam into hydroponic green roof materials – a solid example of generating new applications for rebonded materials, with components originally sourced from customer partners.

Our immediate plans are to continue working with customers to develop more sustainable rebond products, that lower their carbon footprint and drive a more circular economy. Our long-term strategy is to remain a net consumer of trim, divert waste from landfill, and maintain circularity.

Partnering with academia

With The Vita Group’s intention to enhance knowledge-share, in line with international Sustainable Development Goals, the company places an emphasis on partnering with local academic institutions and research leaders.

We owe a lot to the universities and academic institutions that we partner with in terms of intellectual understanding. This is an exciting area for our business, which sees us conducting research with universities into products that may not materialise for five to ten years. It is truly a window into the industry’s future.

In the UK, The Vita Group has forged a partnership with The University of Manchester and its Graphene Engineering Innovation Centre (GEIC). The two have worked jointly on the development and application of enhanced foam products that exploit the remarkable properties of graphene. The partnership allows a sharing of a wealth of specialist knowledge and skill in their respective areas. To date, the results of the collaboration have been impressive.

The benefits of forging industrial/academic alliances are clear to see in this joint endeavour.  The hope now is that the project results in a ground-breaking new product that will further cement Manchester’s position as the home of graphene.

We have also enjoyed working with Northwest based university, Bolton University, recognised internationally for its research into and extensive knowledge of chemistry and materials relating to fire performance across textiles and polymers.

Further work is focusing on legacy chemicals, with a goal of broadening the options for post-consumer recycling.

Partnering with regulatory bodies

Catalysing meaningful change across the PU foam industry means forging links with regulators. Our philosophy has always been to fully embrace the power of partnerships to help drive transformation at policy level. Partnerships with regulators amplify our calls for change. They also enable us to ensure its sustainability efforts are consistent, demonstrable, and grounded in action.

If we take the mattress foam part of our business, for example, the policy landscape in Europe has evolved from focusing on waste to focusing on waste prevention and resource productivity. As a result, rules on Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) for mattresses, where the financial and practical burden of managing waste is transferred to producers, are set to be introduced in France, Belgium, the Netherlands and Scotland (followed by the rest of the UK) by 2025.

In the UK, we strive to support policy makers’ decisions through the provision of information and expertise. And we work closely with industry bodies such as EUROPUR – the European Association of Flexible PU Foam Blocks Manufacturers.

As part of the National Bed Federation (NBF), The Vita Group has signed up to its ‘Pledge for Our Planet’ which asks companies within the bed industry to take steps in unison to address global environmental damage. We have committed to meeting all the core requirements, which need to be fulfilled within two years, focusing on reducing waste, global warming impact, products impact on the environment, demonstrating commitment and taking responsibility for actions.

Measuring sustainable success

Plenty of businesses pay lip service to sustainability but The Vita Group believes actions speak louder than words. The business places significant importance on being able to demonstrate progress against its sustainable goals. Happily, working in partnership with others has hastened that progress on several fronts.

In 2022, The Vita Group, in a bid to be transparent about our sustainable journey, launched its first sustainability report, documenting achievements to date and setting out aspirations for the future. The report was underpinned by The Vita Group’s ESG vision, “Enhancing Everyday Life” and presented measurables under four guiding principles of, ‘Driving Circularity’, ‘Optimising Resources’, ‘Empowering People’ and ‘Acting Ethically.’

We have been striving to improve our processes and develop new technology to reduce our environmental impact. It is important to analyse everything that we do through a ‘green’ lens and set ourselves tough objectives to ensure that we are doing all we can to meet the Paris Climate Accord’s target. If we expect partners to join forces with us, then we must be able to show evidence of the positive results that come from doing so.

To demonstrate its dedication to sustainability, The Vita Group has aligned to the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), making it one of only 2,811 companies worldwide to have their science-based targets validated. In addition, it is one of just 1,391 businesses that have committed to the SBTi’s more exacting target of reductions that will help the world stay on the path to limiting temperature growth to 1.5°C in line with the Paris Climate Accord.

The business keeps a careful eye on the carbon emissions of all operations and has worked hard to reduce them as much as possible. Over 2019 – 21 it reduced Scope 1 emissions (which are direct emissions such as The Vita Group’s fuel use) by 24% and in the same period it cut Scope 2 emissions (which are indirect emissions such as purchased electricity) to just 0.15 tonnes of CO2 from 13,450.

Thanks to these results, we know that we’ve already achieved the SBTi’s target of reducing 46% of direct emissions by 2030. We are also down to just 2.01% of waste going to landfill and 100% of our product developments now have a sustainable alternative built in.

Our most material challenge remains reducing Scope 3 GHG emissions. Accordingly, we are working with others in our industry, including our suppliers, to move beyond disclosure of average emission data, so that we can drill down into the specific sources of unnecessary emissions. We subscribe to the philosophy that incremental improvement is better than delayed perfection. Bit by bit, the pace of change is accelerating.

Purpose driven partnerships for the future

For over 70 years, The Vita Group has sought to lead the sustainability agenda in the flexible PU foam industry and the company is certainly not resting on its laurels. We are constantly seeking new ways to innovate and break boundaries, in the interests of sustainability and working alongside supply chain partners that share its philosophy. 

Collaboration is now happening on a global scale. We recently joined the United Nations Global Compact – one of the world’s most significant corporate citizenship initiatives – and have committed to making its principles part of our strategy, culture, and day-to-day operations. The years ahead will see the business collaborating in multi-stakeholder partnerships on projects that advance the UN’s development goals, including implementing practices to address poverty and inequality and endeavouring to build a better world for future generations.

We view improving our environmental performance as both a moral and a business imperative and we are taking action to lead on performance-enhancing change. We want to continue producing outstanding products but are not willing to do so at the cost to the planet. All our efforts are focused on working in partnership with customers, suppliers, academics, and policymakers to ensure we make a positive impact on the world around us, and we will continue to be transparent about our progress. We do this in the hope that others in the industry will seek to replicate our strategic partnership approach to sustainability. That way, change will come more quickly and be more significant.

In her role as Head of Sustainability, Natalie Watson focuses on further developing The Vita Group’s environmental, social and governance (ESG) strategy, implementing the plans outlined in Enhancing Everyday Life, Vita’s inaugural sustainability report published earlier this year. This involves helping to build a new environmental management system, supporting key greenhouse gas reduction initiatives, and supporting the commercialisation of our sustainability-focused product ranges.

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