Sappi Renews With U.S. EPA SmartWay® Transport Partnership For 12th Consecutive Year

Sappi North America, Inc., a leading producer and supplier of diversified paper, packaging products and pulp, announced that it has extended its current SmartWay® Transport Partnership, an innovative collaboration between U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and industry. The SmartWay Transport Partnership provides a framework to assess the environmental and energy efficiency of goods movement supply chains and benchmark overall performance.

This is Sappi's 12th consecutive year as a SmartWay Transport Partner, and the company will continue to contribute to the Partnership's savings of 279.7 million barrels of oil, $37.5 billion in fuel costs and 134 million tons of air pollutants. This collective effort is the equivalent of the annual electricity use in 18.2 million homes. By being a part of the SmartWay Transport Partnership, Sappi demonstrates its strong environmental leadership and corporate responsibility.

"With sustainability at the core of Sappi's business, we are proud to continue enhancing our environmental freight management practices as a long-time SmartWay Partner," said Anne Ayer (photo), Vice President, Pulp Business and Supply Chain at Sappi North America. "We are thankful for this organization and the other partners for working alongside us to collectively communicate fuel use and calculate freight emissions to lead to more informed decisions."

The partnership was developed jointly in early 2003 by EPA and Charter Partners represented by industry stakeholders, environmental groups, American Trucking Associations, and Business for Social Responsibility. Partners rely upon SmartWay tools and approaches to track and reduce emissions and fuel use from goods movement. The Partnership currently has over 3,000 partners including shipper, logistics companies, truck, rail, barge, and multimodal carriers.

As a certified shipper partner, Sappi utilizes carriers that leverage technology and design to minimize their collective carbon footprint. Sappi works toward increasing the amount of freight moved on intermodal and rail as well as increasing the amount of freight moved on certified carriers.