Press Release

ZEISS Sunlens Presents Climate-Friendly Sun Lenses

23 February 2022

Varese, Italy / Aalen, Germany | 23 February 2022 | ZEISS Vision Care

ZEISS Sunlens reaches another essential milestone within its sun lens range materials and continues on the road to responsible production along the entire value chain.

ZEISS Sunlens is the division of the ZEISS Group dedicated to the research, development, and production of prescription-free high-quality sunglass lenses to offer protection from the sun's rays as well as superior optical performance. The brand wants to extend its values of quality, trust, performance, innovation, and creativity to sunglasses producers and consumers.
Strong awareness of the environment motivated ZEISS Sunlens to develop a climate-friendly plano lens through the improvement of the production facilities and the use of renewable resources. The result is a lens that reduces carbon dioxide emissions - an improvement certified throughout the value chain by independent organizations.

New raw material and new production process lead to climate-friendly lenses.
New raw material and new production process lead to climate-friendly lenses.

New raw material and new production process lead to climate-friendly lenses.

New raw material and new production process lead to climate-friendly lenses.

Sustainable polyamide was developed by a team of ZEISS researchers from different departments who collaborated to create this exceptional product. This also represents an important contribution to the sustainability process the company is undertaking.

"The use of exclusively renewable energy in the Italian plant and in much of the production process is significantly cutting the emissions of CO2", explains Mathias Maffei, Product Innovation Manager at ZEISS Sunlens.
In the new lens production process, 39 percent of bio-based raw materials have replaced the fossil resources that were previously used in the value chain. The organic raw material itself comes from the waste produced by the agricultural and lumber industries. The carbon footprint of this lens has been reduced by 50 percent compared to a fully fossil-based manufacturing process. The new climate-friendly sun lenses maintain the features, high-quality standards, and optical performance of their previous polyamide counterparts.

ZEISS Sunlens was meticulous and wanted the entire production chain to be certified to REDcert² standards (scheme principles for the certification of sustainable material flows for the chemical industry). The mass balanced product offers a sustainable polyamide lens with verified use of bio-based material and emissions reduction. REDcert² utilizes the mass balance approach: this accounting method ensures that the sustainable bio-based raw materials are blended in upstream facilities with fossil-based raw materials. They are then allocated downstream exclusively to the production of plano sun lenses, following the principle of verified volumes in every step of the value chain. This is one of the few international sustainability certification schemes covering all stages of the value chain with uniform and harmonized criteria and therefore offering a guarantee of integrity for the sustainability attributes associated with the certified product.

ZEISS Sunlens is proud of its certification, which again proves the company's transparency and seriousness regarding a contemporary and important issue and represents added value to an already high-quality product.

ZEISS Sunlens Presents Climate-Friendly Sun Lenses
ZEISS Sunlens Presents Climate-Friendly Sun Lenses
ZEISS Sunlens Presents Climate-Friendly Sun Lenses
ZEISS Sunlens Presents Climate-Friendly Sun Lenses
ZEISS Sunlens Presents Climate-Friendly Sun Lenses
ZEISS Sunlens Presents Climate-Friendly Sun Lenses

“Our goal with this sustainable lens is to be 100 percent aware of the resources that are used throughout the process and what the overall impact of this lens represents from the raw material to the finished lens,” says Pietro Speroni, Head of ZEISS Sunlens. “We aren’t looking for an easy claim to be green but for a thoroughly verified and certified process which makes a difference to our environment.”

Starting from January 2022, the new ZEISS Sunlens’ sustainable polyamide will be the only polyamide produced in Italy and will completely replace the classic material.

Portrait Joachim Kuss
Press contact Joachim Kuss General Topics and Sustainability

ZEISS Vision Care

Press contact Flora Schierano

ZEISS Sunlens

About ZEISS

ZEISS is an internationally leading technology enterprise operating in the fields of optics and optoelectronics. In the previous fiscal year, the ZEISS Group generated annual revenue totaling 7.5 billion euros in its four segments Semiconductor Manufacturing Technology, Industrial Quality & Research, Medical Technology and Consumer Markets (status: 30 September 2021).

For its customers, ZEISS develops, produces and distributes highly innovative solutions for industrial metrology and quality assurance, microscopy solutions for the life sciences and materials research, and medical technology solutions for diagnostics and treatment in ophthalmology and microsurgery. The name ZEISS is also synonymous with the world's leading lithography optics, which are used by the chip industry to manufacture semiconductor components. There is global demand for trendsetting ZEISS brand products such as eyeglass lenses, camera lenses and binoculars.

With a portfolio aligned with future growth areas like digitalization, healthcare and Smart Production and a strong brand, ZEISS is shaping the future of technology and constantly advancing the world of optics and related fields with its solutions. The company's significant, sustainable investments in research and development lay the foundation for the success and continued expansion of ZEISS' technology and market leadership. ZEISS invests 13 percent of its revenue in research and development – this high level of expenditure has a long tradition at ZEISS and is also an investment in the future.

With over 35,000 employees, ZEISS is active globally in almost 50 countries with around 30 production sites, 60 sales and service companies and 27 research and development facilities. Founded in 1846 in Jena, the company is headquartered in Oberkochen, Germany. The Carl Zeiss Foundation, one of the largest foundations in Germany committed to the promotion of science, is the sole owner of the holding company, Carl Zeiss AG.

Further information at www.zeiss.com

 

ZEISS Vision Care
ZEISS Vision Care is one of the world's leading manufacturers of eyeglass lenses and ophthalmic instruments. The unit is allocated to the Consumer Markets segment and develops and produces offerings for the entire eyeglass value chain that are distributed globally under the ZEISS brand.

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