Nationwide Building Society is the latest financial institution to order recycled PVC cards from IDEMIA. The cards are part of IDEMIA’s broader Greenpay portfolio, which debuted in October and offers e-documents and other eco-friendly services in addition to the recycled PVC cards.
The new recycled PVC cards will go out in the spring of 2021. The first ones will be sent to existing Nationwide customers, though the bank eventually plans to expand the scope of the partnership to cover its entire product range. Nationwide currently issues 5.4 million new payment cards every single year, and is hoping to get rid of single-use plastics by 2025.
According to Nationwide, each recycled PVC card will save seven grams of carbon. At that rate, the company will reduce its carbon output by 35 metric tons over the course of the entire year. It also claims to be the first high street lender in the UK to make the switch to recycled PVC.
“Migrating to recycled plastics saves energy, limits oil consumption and reduces greenhouse gas emissions, to help mitigate global warming and reduce air pollution,” said IDEMIA Financial Institutions EVP Amanda Gourbault. “Nationwide’s decision to provide its members with eco-friendly PVC cards confirms our objective to provide green solutions that help protect our planet – because banking cards shouldn’t cost the earth.”
“Our members tell us that they want to make the world a greener place,” added Nationwide Chief Strategy and Sustainability Officer Claire Tracey. “Earlier this year we became carbon neutral for energy and emissions for all internal operations and Society vehicles. Today’s news is another step for us in helping the UK to achieve net-zero by 2050.”
IDEMIA has already provided recycled PVC cards for Spain’s BBVA and for the French neobank Onlyone. The latter were delivered through IDEMIA’s partnership with Treezor.
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