Products & Solutions
Minimizing our environmental impact with an ambition to create low-carbon and circular solutions with optimized impact potential.
Sustainability
Products and components represent the biggest part of our total company emissions and will require great transition from how we design and produce our products, to how we deliver our solutions. We aim to create low-carbon and circular solutions with optimized impact potential. Below you will find highlights from our action plan toward our ambition.
Emission update
Products and components are the biggest contributor to our emissions, accounting for 37% of our
total emissions. Between 2019 to 2023, the carbon intensity of our products and components has decreased by 18%. During this time, we tested and introduced new environmentally friendly and low CO2 material options for selected products (see our Sustainability Report).
Although the impact is currently small overall, it has been a crucial learning phase. We believe the effect will be significant as we leverage our gained expertise and scale up the use of these sustainable materials across a larger part of our portfolio in the coming years.
Reduction plan - products
Reduce, reuse, recycle
Our product design philosophy follows the ‘reduce, reuse, recycle’ mindset. We optimize resources by using smarter design techniques to minimize material use. We prioritize durability, reusability, and refurbishment where feasible. And at the end of a product’s life cycle, we design for recyclability.
Products and materials used in our products represent the biggest part of our total emission, so focus on sustainability in our product development process is key. We have developed and are implementing three key tools to ensure that we make informed decisions in the product development process: the ZeroAim Tool and Knowledge Library, the Simplified LCA Tool and a Sustainability Business Case Model.
Carbon footprints reduction
We use post-consumer/industrial recycled content and highly recyclable plastics to reduce carbon footprint and improve recyclability. We replace fossil-based polymers with low-carbon renewable feedstock for identical product functionality. In textiles/packaging, we enable high recycled content for mom-material packaging to enhance recyclability.
Circularity
In addition to designing for recyclability and refurbishment, we are also looking into how we can enhance recycling and refurbishment internally. As discussed in the Net Zero Site section, we have good systems and initiatives in place to recycle scrap, and waste, and in Mexico we have expanded to also take-back and recycle used products.
Digitization and digitalization
To create sustainable solutions, improving digitization and digitalization is crucial. Digitization involves creating software solutions to reduce material usage while digitization converts physical products into digital form for tracking and enhancing functionality.
Services
We minimize environmental impact while increasing product use. “Needs-based subscription models” and a sharing-based ownership model improve resource efficiency and reduce waste. This allows us to save lives with the same or lower carbon footprint.
The pandemic led to a shift towards virtual services, which offers improved value due to time, emission, and cost efficiencies. Virtual services expand productivity, efficiency, utilization, and patient risk-reduction through better learning and up-time. We have a goal to offer 80% of services virtually.
Examples of our progress
Several of our basic CPR manikins are made of plastic foil to make them more affordable and reduce emissions related to logistics as they are low-weight and inflated or filled with water prior to use. In 2023, we changed the material in several plastic foil products to now include 20% regrinded materials. Quality has been maintained, and we plan to expand this approach to more of our plastic foil-based products.
Smart packaging solution for SimMan leads to 93% reduction in carbon emissions
SimMan, the world’s most widely used patient simulator is now packed in cardboard rather than the textile suitcases it has traditionally been packed in.
This initiative has led to a significant reduction in carbon emissions from 134.92 kg CO2e for one set of suitcases to 9.167 kg CO2e. In addition, the entire packaging is fully recyclable, and being half the size of the old packaging has led to space efficiency in shipping.
68% reduction in carbon emissions for Little Anne
Little Anne, our highest volume basic life support manikin, has been redesigned resulting in a 68% reduction in carbon emissions per manikin. The product uses 59% less material than the previous version and 60% recycled plastics. Single-use PVC lungs are replaced by a single-use filter, and the stackable design uses less volume in transportation.
86% carbon reduction on the new Laerdal AED Trainer
A new Laerdal AED Trainer, will be launched in 2023. As a generic AED trainer, it allows customers to buy one training model instead of multiple versions. This, together with the use of recycled material, has resulted in a estimated carbon reduction of us to 70% compared with the previous model.
Processes & Tools
ZeroAim Tool and Knowledge Library
The ZeroAim Tool is a qualitative tool consisting of sustainability-related questions and tips on making the solution more sustainable.
The tool is divided into three different categories;
- Single-use products (such as medical products that cannot be reused due to hygiene criteria),
- Reusable products (such as most of our training products and simulators),
- digital products (such as apps and digital systems).
Within each category are questions designed for the respective use model of the product, with a tip for each question.
To complement the tool, we have a Sustainability Knowledge Library consisting of insight and guidelines for designing more sustainable solutions. The tool is being implemented by the teams throughout the product development process.
Simplified LCA Tool
The Simplified LCA Tool is a quantitative tool with a calculator to measure CO2e emissions from products and logistics.
We are implementing the tool to be used to compare one material type to another in the product development process and conduct a complete LCA for a product.
By combining the ZeroAim Tool and the Simplified LCA Tool, we ensure that the teams get guidelines on how to design for more sustainable solutions and use the LCA tool to check and ensure that the design choices lead to minimized product emissions.
Sustainability Business Case Model
The Sustainability Business Case Model is a tool used to ensure sustainability is integrated into the commercial Business Case Model. The Sustainability Business Case Model uses input from the Simplified LCA Tool and illustrates the CO2e emission against the monetary cost.
We are working on implementing an internal shadow price for carbon in the Business Case Model.