Consultancy firm Basoinsa won the Basque Country “International Cooperation for Sustainable Development” category with its cooperation project to improve and conserve the environment.

Basoinsa also won the national prize, meaning that it will compete in Brussels in early June for European award.

Basoinsa received this recognition for a cooperation project in Cundinamarca (Colombia) whose objective is the environmental recovery of a 16-km stretch of the Chicú river (tributary of the Bogotá river) on a 983,330 m2 area that flows through municipality of Tenjo.

Management for sustainable development

In the “Management for sustainable development” category, Vicinay Sestao triumphed in the medium and large companies’ category with “Life Cycle Analysis”, with a means to determine the potential environmental aspects and impact generated by the activity of an organisation and its suppliers. The company offers solutions for anchoring floating equipment in the offshore world, mainly used for mining, exploration and production of oil and gas, and offshore wind power generation.

The runner-up in this category was Industrias de Turbo Propulsores, which has made a strong commitment to technological development and investment in R&D. It works closely with the European Union’s Clean Sky 2 research programme which has attracted investments above €40 million. In 2018, ITP Aero hosted the annual Integrated Technology Demonstrators (ITD) meeting, Clean Sky 2 programme’s engine technology area aimed at reducing gas and CO2 emissions, as well as cutting aircraft noise levels.

Products and Services for Sustainable Development

In the category “Product and Service for Sustainable Development”, A&B Laboratorios de Biotecnología took the award in the micro and small companies’ category. The company presented a range of products called eco-solvents. This type of products, aimed at industrial cleaning and degreasing processes. They are effective substitutes, safer to use, better for the environment and have more added value than traditional hazardous solvents.
In this category, Recircular environmental services won second prize for an app that allows users to analyse the sustainability of resource transactions, calculating their impact from an ecological, economic, and social point of view.

In medium and large companies, Eroski won the award for its sustainable fishing and fish distribution activity. This activity makes it the first retail distribution chain in Spain to pass the fresh fish from sustainable fishing grounds audit through its commitment to local fishermen’s associations.

Processes for sustainable development

In the “Process for Sustainable Development” category, the award for micro and small enterprises went to Compo Global Solutions for its innovative composting technology. The company set out to improve the composting process using an innovative technology that makes use of all kinds of organic by-products.

The aim of this solution is to reduce the environmental impact of processing these materials and to produce high-quality organic fertilisers to replace mineral fertilisers. On the other hand, Metallo Spain received the award in medium and large companies category for its reuse of complex non-ferrous materials containing heavy metals utilising a patented metallurgical process. Materials with low copper content, which are difficult to recover by other methods are used to produce black copper (Cu ˜ 80%) which is eventually refined within the Metallo group, returning the waste metals back to the value chain.

Circular Economy

Finally, in the Circular Economy category, Ekomodo Sustainable Company won the award for micro and small businesses for the design and development of computer and tablet cases, reusable bags, mousepads, cases and pens made from plastic waste. Ekomodo makes products and accessories for other organisations and users from recycled plastic waste.

Regarding medium and large companies, Grupo Celulosa Moldeadas (CEMOSA) won the prize for fruit and vegetable packaging made from moulded recycled paper fibres and fibres from agricultural waste. This packaging can be heat-sealed if necessary with a compostable film. These features make its carbon footprint lower compared to other packaging.