Iron foundries are the ultimate recyclers, creating new products by recycling old iron castings 和 scrap steel. But melting metal requires large quantities of 能源 和 we're doing our part to change this reality in substantial ways. Waupaca铸造 maintains a formal 可持续性 program with four key areas of focus, along with specific objectives we're striving to reach by the year 2020:
可持续性: 环境 Stewardship at Waupaca铸造
迈克尔Hoecker | Waupaca铸造- 减少25%的能源使用.
- 减少80%的用水量.
- Promote state-of-the-art pollution control technologies.
- Reduce spent foundry s和 by 30% while promoting offsite reuse/recycling opportunities of remaining spent foundry materials to achieve zero l和fill disposal.
We're on our way to meeting these goals. Between 2009 和 2011 alone, we reduced 能源 intensity at all six of our plants by more than 16%. As part of our environmental stewardship, we've achieved some significant 可持续性 initiatives thus far:
- Waupaca铸造 has been recycling foundry s和 和 related materials for more than two decades. Approximately 70% of foundry s和 byproducts that can no longer be used in metalcasting are cleaned 和 reused in local projects including road 和 general construction, 农业和土工填筑.
- Closed-loop cooling 水 systems have reduced plant 水 cooling dem和s by 80% or more. 在某些情况下, non-contact cooling 水 discharges are reduced to near zero 和 daily 水 use is drastically reduced.
- Waupaca铸造 began retrofitting plants with sophisticated 空气 pollution controls beginning in 1999. Both 空气 emission controls 和 leak detection technology have surpassed regulatory requirements 和 created new industry benchmarks in pollution control.
最近, we've been bringing 能源 efficient lighting upgrades to our plant floors 和 the results have been big 和 bright returns.
Waupaca铸造 可持续性: LED Retrofit Initiative
LED灯泡终于成熟了. By now, most people recognize that changing out old inc和escent light bulbs saves a lot of 能源. LED bulbs use 75% less 能源 和 last up to 10 years longer than inc和escent bulbs. Multiply that by the number of lighting units in Waupaca铸造's 2.2 million square feet of plant space, 和 that's a lot of 能源 saved. An all-out conversion of all our plants to LED is costly but it is part of our commitment at Waupaca铸造. Financial incentives help us defray costs so we can tackle the challenge much faster 和 sooner, helping us meet our 2020 goal of reducing 能源 by 25%.
生产车间位于 工厂6 in Etowah have already been entirely converted to 能源 saving LED fixtures. 这家工厂收到了一份 来自Etowah公用事业公司的399,830美元回扣 和 the Tennessee Valley Authority, roughly 50% of the retrofit investment. Replacing conventional lights with LED lights will save the gray 和 ductile iron foundry in Etowah about 5,088,000 kilowatt hours which is equivalent to the annual electricity use of 339 average Tennessee homes. From an overall environmental perspective, 这个数目减少了2,每年二氧化碳排放量为933吨, which equates to 885 acres of trees planted per year. Plant 4 is in the middle of the same production floor upgrades 和 has already received a $57,000 rebate from Wisconsin’s Focus on Energy program. 工厂1,2,3,5 are also methodically converting a few areas at a time to LED lighting before moving on to the next ones. 除了, every expansion project Waupaca铸造 undertakes will include LED lighting as part of the project. 所有 能源 savings costs are reinvested in other 可持续性 initiatives 和 technologies to defray rapidly rising cost of 能源.
Waupaca铸造 可持续性: Addressing Energy Costs 和 More
Committing to 可持续性 helps us mitigate the rising cost of 能源 和 that helps us maintain product costs that keep our customers happy. But that's not the main reason for what we do. We do it, because it's absolutely the right thing to do. For our employees, our customers, our communities, 和 our planet.
We also think it's important to the communities 和 customers we serve to tell our 可持续性 story through reliable reporting. 我们使用 全球报告倡议组织 框架. GRI has become the de facto st和ard for measuring 和 reporting 可持续性 performance. 你会看到我们2014年的报道 在这里.
This is an evolution 和 we're learning more as we go. But one thing is certain: you can count on Waupaca铸造 to lead the way to 可持续性 和 能源 savings.
