Bron Curley, managing director of Océ UK, outlined the company's agenda at the event, entitled 'Make Energy and Climate Change Strategies work for your Business', which aims to provide strategies to reducing a company's impact on global climate change.

Curley, who took over the role in November last year from Nico Kooy, was a keynote speaker at the event alongside award-winning scientist and Greenpeace campaigner, Jeremy Leggett.

Océ UK launched its Carbon Positive Plus+ initiative at Digital Print World last October.

The scheme is part of Océ's plans to strengthen its environmental credentials through a new long-term alliance with Lincoln-based Shining Earth – part of environmental consultant Delta-Simons.

The press manufacturer has committed to offsetting 200% of the CO2 created by each of its VarioPrint 6000 machines sold, until at least November this year.

The initiative begun initially across the VarioPrint 6000 systems, with the CO2 emissions calculated during the period offset using three international schemes, which have focused on renewable energy in China, methane capture in Germany and tree-planting projects in the UK.

In addition, Océ is offering customers the opportunity to take up an environmental stewardship scheme. The company will pay for two days' consultancy as part of the stewardship appraisal, intended to help its customers improve environmental performance.

Curley said: "Nobody in the printing industry or elsewhere can turn a blind eye to the environmental challenges that we all face, which is why we wanted to further strengthen our environmental credentials through a new long-term alliance and world-first initiative for the printing industry."

He added: "The initial reaction to our carbon offsetting scheme has been beyond our wildest expectations and, outside of this conference, we also anticipate making substantial announcements about the latest developments in the near future."