Elmo’s waste water becomes drinking water.

As a leading supplier of high quality leather to the Railway Industry globally, Elmo has taken a great leap in becoming one with nature.

Elmo is one of the leading manufacturers in the world of exclusive yet eco-friendly, sustainable leather. We have over the years grown to become one of the six largest providers of leather to the rail, automotive, airline and furniture industries. We operate in around 40 various markets globally, forcing us to evolve our product and processes to stay ahead in a competitive market, yet never failing our commitment to the nature and our planet. Elmo has today around 120 employees based at Elmo in Svenljunga, Sweden. The leather that we produce specifically for the Railway segment, is developed to meet the demands of this rapidly growing industry. All our leather has the highest technical properties, exceeding the international standards in terms of certifications such as EN45545. Our tannery located on the West Coast of Sweden has for decades kept focus on the very environmental aspects of the process when making high quality leather. For many years, Elmo has been searching for an International Environment Certificate but with no such certification in place, Elmo decided to develop an industry benchmark that do not just focus on the product but includes the complete process of company manufacturing and beyond.

“A tannery should not be measured just by the levels of chemicals in the leather, but also by the chemicals in the waste water” says Sales Director, Jimmy Ahlgren.

For Elmo, having an environmental sound production of leather is part of the company’s core values and part of the Elmo success story. The road to where Elmo is today, has not always been straight forward. A lot of hard work and commitment by the people of Elmo has gone into the process of putting Elmo on the world map as a leader of environmentally friendly tanneries.

Back in the early years of 2000, the wastewater from the tannery was discharged to the local treatment plant in Svenljunga together with the wastewater of all the municipal. However, the majority of the water load was coming from the tannery production and the situation was far from ideal. It became an obstacle, preventing further increase of the tannery’s leather production and company growth. Also, the environmental authorities of Sweden were putting pressure on the tannery to reduce the nitrogen pollution levels. For several years the reduction of the nitrogen discharge to rivers and lakes had been of very high priority in Sweden. Elmo pulled on all their experience and resources and took on the challenge to introduce a new treatment process for the tanning industry. The goal was clear: a dramatic reduction of nitrogen pollution in the waste water and to become one of the greenest tanneries in the world. In 2004 Elmo invested a substantial sum of €5 million and many hours of research into a new cleaning facility. The investment shaped a filtering processes in a never seen before and surpassing the reduction targets. This was achieved by making changes in processes and making substitution of chemicals. Soon, nitrogen levels were reduced by 94% and further reductions were also seen in other pollutants. For example, chromium levels have dropped by a full 99.6%, BOD 99.9% and COD 99.1%.

In 2005-2006 the EU LIFE Fund identified the 22 best LIFE-Environment projects in Europe. Elmo’s plant for treatment of waste water, was proud to be recognised as one of them. This EU LIFE supported project has demonstrated that it is possible to reduce the nitrogen discharge from the leather industry by more than 80% in a cost-effective way. Today the success continuous: The reduced amount of water used in the tanning process is taken from the nearby river and is later returned back into the river cleaner than before! Downstream, a regional cleaning facility is turning the water from the river into drinking water, supplying cities on the Swedish West Coast with clean, safe drinking water.Elmo is probably the first tannery to accomplish this achievement and do indeed see themselves as the greenest tannery in the world with a unique, ecosystem in place.

“We proudly see this as a proof of minimum impact on the environment and as a great leap becoming one with nature” Mr. Ahlgren says.

Choose environment – Choose Elmo!