Celebrating Sustainability at the MDC Awards

Held during the Gala Dinner at the recent MDC 2023 in Ottawa, Canada, the MDC Awards included an additional category for the first time, namely the ‘Best Sustainability Initiative’.

Last month’s issue of Coin & Mint News covered the category winner, the Royal Dutch Mint’s ‘The Dutch Vault’, and this month we cover the other two finalists – the US Mint’s ‘Circulating Blank Annealing Furnace Retrofit’, and The Royal Mint’s ‘Local Energy Centre (LEC)’.

Circulating Blank Annealing Furnace Retrofit

The United States Mint was one of three finalists in the category, for its programme to reduce natural gas usage and pollutant output while maintaining thermal and operational characteristics of the furnaces used at its plants in Philadelphia and Denver.

To achieve this goal, the protective atmosphere used in the annealing process was switched from the traditional exogas generated by natural gas combustion to a mixture of high purity gas at a ratio of 97% nitrogen to 3% hydrogen. Both are created in cabinet generators near the furnaces, utilising electricity and water provided by the local utility company.