With what specific measures can companies become climate-neutral? How can they develop circular business models and create digital product passports? This is precisely what companies from various industries are working on in the project „Pathways to the Climate-Neutral Company“ – including ZINQ.

„Our surfaces are sustainable, modular and recyclable. We want to document the environmental impact of products and make it comparable. This is intended to serve as a blueprint so that product passports become feasible for small and medium-sized enterprises,“ emphasises ZINQ CEO Lars Baumgürtel.

The two-year project is a collaboration between the association Klimaschutz-Unternehmen e.V. and the Department of Environmentally Compatible Products and Processes (upp) at the University of Kassel. Philipp Andree, Managing Director of Klimaschutz-Unternehmen, explains: „A circular economy strategy will soon be added to the climate neutrality goal. Circular economy will thus become another challenge for companies. This means that in future they will have to create digital product passports for their products containing data on raw materials and environmental impacts for the entire life cycle. However, there is hardly any experience so far. That is why we are investigating how companies can implement this.“

An initial round of the project involving ten member companies of the association Klimaschutz-Unternehmen e.V. already ran from early 2021 to the end of 2022 – ZINQ was also involved in this.