LORENZ at the award ceremony of the German Sustainability Award
As one of six finalists, LORENZ took part in the award ceremony for the 15th German Sustainability Prize in Düsseldorf on December 2nd at the Maritim Hotel in Düsseldorf. LORENZ won the “Local Heroes” competition from among 1,000 participants in the sustainability award.
This year’s event featured high-ranking celebrities, including Federal Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Prince Albert of Monaco and Mehmet Scholl on the guest list.
Straw as a sustainable building product
LORENZ’s contribution described the effort, based on its own sustainability model, not only to consistently reduce CO2 within the company, but also to use the company’s growth for local climate protection: The annual production volume of LORENZ wood-straw modules stores more CO2 in the buildings than is used for their further processing, marketing and transport.
This makes LORENZ a company that stores CO2 in terms of its climate balance, i.e. one whose value creation is based on negative emissions and thus on CO2 removal.< /p>
The marketing of natural building products, i.e. LORENZ’s core business with its wood-straw construction and insulation elements, results in a reduction in CO2 emissions in the building sector, for which the EU plans to achieve climate neutrality by 2050. The good insulating properties of the elements equipped with pressed straw also ensure a reduction in the energy requirements of houses.
The use of straw in construction also shortens delivery routes, avoids raw material bottlenecks and disposal problems throughout the entire life cycle.
What makes LORENZ a “local hero”
Locally, LORENZ is already involved in local climate protection activities and in political discourse. The aim is, on the one hand, to communicate more sustainable practice and, on the other hand, to reduce CO2 emissions in the surrounding area. The collaboration with the “Taucha Climate Alliance” is proving to be successful. LORENZ also succeeded, together with the Bundestag member Dr. Christiane Schenderlein, MdB, to initiate a sustainability summit at which entrepreneurs, government representatives and state politicians discussed concrete environmental policy measures.
In addition to collaborating with local research institutions for product improvements and raw material knowledge, LORENZ is primarily interested in re-establishing Northern Saxony as a center for clay and straw construction. In the last century, the north of Leipzig was characterized by adobe buildings.
Local offsetting as a future model
In addition, LORENZ is already striving to sell its avoided CO2 generation locally in such a way that CO2– Intensive, non-profit organizations benefit from this: emergency services, aid organizations, environmental associations or social service providers generate emissions that become a challenge with increasing decarbonization. LORENZ is already actively offering its negative emissions in order to make the CO2 generated by non-profit activities climate-neutral.
Depending on growth and advancing CO2 pricing, LORENZ can also relieve local companies in the future. The region therefore benefits indirectly from ecological building.
Even more ecological consistency despite climate-positive production
Straw is a valuable raw material for LORENZ, so that even offcuts or waste generated during production should be reused in the future. As part of the sustainability strategy, the “Zero Waste Strategy” was successfully implemented at the production site in 2022: by investing in a briquetting machine, LORENZ is now able to press the smallest production waste into a format that can be further processed.
