By Dan McCue

NORTH CHARLESTON -- To many who pass by it each day as they drive on Interstate 526 and the Don Holt Bridge, MeadWestvaco’s North Charleston mill, with its belching smokestacks and hard, industrial façade, is the very picture of the industrialization that once defined the neck region and left it with a legacy of pollution and environmental remediation.

But look beyond mere appearance and MeadWestvaco has a far greener story to tell, especially here in the Lowcountry.

Between 2003 and 2006, the company reduced carbon dioxide emissions companywide by more than 5%, said Bob Fledderman, MeadWestvaco’s manager for environmental and regulatory assurance.

Even better, it has reduced its carbon dioxide emissions at its North Charleston facility by nearly 8%, and recently, as part of its ongoing involvement with the Chicago Climate Exchange, a voluntary marketplace for selling, buying and banking carbon credits, the company vowed to reduce its emissions another 2% by 2010.

MeadWestvaco’s North Charleston facility is among its most versatile, serving as a paperboard mill, a specialties chemical plant and a research center.

“In a sense, what we’ve done at MeadWestvaco is try to get a jump on the future,” Fledderman explained during a recent interview with the Charleston Regional Business Journal, sister publication of SCBIZ. “Reducing emission and trying to save on energy usage and the like is certainly the right thing to do and part of being a good corporate citizen.

“At the same time, I’m sure within the next few years, it’s also going to be what we have to do, by federal regulatory mandate. Given those factors, MeadWestvaco made a fundamental decision to be ahead of the curve rather than behind it and trying to catch up.”

The avalanche of information about climate change in the media and customers’ resultant inquiries about the “green” aspects of MeadWestvaco’s products inspired the company to become a founding member of the Chicago Climate Exchange several years ago, Fledderman said.

“In fact, our involvement with the exchange even predates the merger” of Mead Paper and Westvaco in 2002, he said.

Through the exchange, corporations have agreed to a contract that requires them to reduce emissions by specified amounts over strictly defined periods.

Although many companies initially saw the exchange as another potential revenue source, one through which they could sell credits achieved by reductions in the emissions of greenhouse gases, over time the organization has evolved into something of an informal think tank for corporate environmental officials.

“As people have become more and more fearful of the adverse impacts of climate change, I think the exchange has become more of a vehicle for companies to learn how to live in a more greenhouse gas-constrained future,” Fledderman said. “Being a member of the exchange gives us valuable experience in learning how to do that.”

In assessing its emission reductions, MeadWestvaco officials focus only on the direct emissions coming from their major mills, of which there are four in the United States, and its converting facilities.

These are the same class of emissions that are the focus of activity on the Chicago Climate Exchange.