Environment

Waste management

We improve waste management throughout the life cycle of our processes and work to develop our company's Circular Economy strategy. This new production and consumption economic model transforms waste into new resources as opposed to a traditional linear economy based on the take, make, and dispose model.

One of our major challenges is to meet our zero waste to landfill target. Using landfills results in loss of materials and energy in addition to the impact it has on the soil, on surface and ground water, and on the emission of greenhouse gases.

At Repsol, we work to reduce waste generation and promote reusing and recycling.

We are committed to minimizing our impact on the environment by taking different measures:

1. Reduce risk by cutting the amount of waste considered hazardous, minimizing impacts on how its managed, and boosting safety for people and the environment.

2. Respect the waste hierarchy as established by the Waste Directive. We minimize waste production, encourage reusing and recycling before resorting to recovery, and in turn prioritize recovery over disposal to a landfill. The main benefits of avoiding disposal to a landfill are:

Environmental, social, and strategic: thanks to the reduction of our company's environmental footprint by optimizing processes throughout the entire value chain.
Financial: in terms of external management and taxation.

3. Draw up an extended waste map that, along with the associated indicators, allows us to measure our waste management performance every year with a focus on continuous improvement.

On the map, we classify waste by business unit or area, type, frequency (regular/one-off), and origin: the waste we generate may come from production activities, maintenance operations, special operations, or could be a result of soil remediation, drilling operations, or from building and dismantling facilities.

We also classify waste as either hazardous or non-hazardous depending on certain criteria such as toxicity and flammability, and we take measures to internally manage that waste, while focusing on every phase of our work. Our priority is to minimize waste generation and reduce waste disposal at landfills by reusing and recycling it, in line with the hierarchy established in the best practices for waste.

4. Establish various lines of action, linked to the Circular Economy Package measures set out by the European Commission. Our lines of action include:

Improving waste management by transforming internal waste into raw materials and/or secondary products for our own or third-party processes.
Promoting recycling and reusing through projects such as recycling lubricant containers or recovering oil from the pyrolysis of plastics that cannot be mechanically recycled.
Applying new technologies to develop new materials that help to reduce the use of resources and waste generation.
Using renewable and biodegradable raw materials.
Analyzing opportunities, challenges, and new business models, as well as the potential treatment of external waste.
Eco-designing new products to enhance their environmental performance.

Environment

Waste management

Taking action to reach our zero waste target

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