Top 10 Greenest Companies in the U.S.
Newsweek recently released it list of the top 10 greenest companies in the US. Let’s take a look at the top 5 companies taking the biggest strides toward sustainable business and how they are doing it.
1. Biogen, one of the oldest and largest biotechnology companies in the world, has taken first place as this year’s greenest company in the US. Biogen’s sustainability goals fit within the context of broader sector, geographic and ecological limits. This has driven Biogen to significantly reduce its environmental footprint while still growing its business. Recognizing the heavy demands on water made by the biotech sector, Biogen has worked to reduce water usage across its operations. Its Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, facility features a 100,000-gallon cistern to harvest rainwater for irrigation, significantly reducing municipal water consumption. In its two main labs in Cambridge, Biogen has opted for an innovative approach. The building housing them saves the condensate water produced by the facility’s heating, ventilation, air conditioning and refrigeration units—some 2.4 million gallons of water—and uses it in the facility’s cooling towers (newsweek.com).
2. Allergan, a health care company most well known for making botox, has fallen from first place 2nd this year. As the botox market rockets, Allergan is focusing a large part of their profit and attention on becoming more sustainable. Allergan started several energy efficiency projects and improved their waste management strategies drastically in recent years. A new solar panel installed at their Irvine, California HQ reduced electricity consumption by 11% from 2011 to 2012. On top of working within their own company to stay green, Allergan participates in numerous programs to help other companies improve their energy efficiency (sustainability-certification.com).
3. Adobe, the well known IT giant, is number 3 on the list. In 2012, Adobe became carbon neutral. This came 2 years before their original goal of 2015. In the past 12 years, Adobe has completed more than 180 energy efficiency projects that have reduced electricity use by 50 percent, natural gas use by 30 percent, domestic water use by 79 percent and irrigation water use by 71 percent. Adobe has also invested in renewable-energy technologies, including Windspire wind turbines and Bloom Energy fuel cells to help power several of its California facilities. These projects plus the continuous strive for new ways to be efficient and sustainable are why Adobe makes the top 5.
4. Broadcom Corporation, another IT company, has joined the ranks of greenest companies along side fellow IT company, Adobe. Broadcom designs and develops the integrated circuits that facilitate modern digital communications.The company has committed to increasing its energy efficiency and reducing natural-resource consumption, greenhouse-gas emissions and other negative environmental effects associated with the company’s global real estate portfolio. One way Broadcom is delivering on this promise is reducing water consumption. For example, its Irvine, California, headquarters uses more than 17 million gallons of reclaimed water for landscape irrigation annually—making it the largest user of reclaimed water in the city of Irvine (newsweek.com).
5. Sigma-Aldrich is a life science and advanced-technology company that manufactures a huge array of products used primarily in scientific research, biotechnology and pharmaceutical development. In recent years, the company has doubled down on its commitment to reduce water use; a recent project to improve steam use and boiler efficiency at the company’s headquarters in St. Louis led to savings of over 4,000 cubic meters of water in 2012. They also created a project that helps them to identify chances to reduce carbon emissions and fuel consumption by using the sea instead of the sky for shipping.
Here at Waste to Energy Systems, we think it is important to recognize companies that are making sustainable efforts to learn and grow together as a green community.
