Zero Landfill
Reduce, reuse and recycle. Southwire is taking this concept to the extreme – zero waste disposal. In 2007, manufacturing plants and offices at Southwire’s corporate headquarters sent close to 17,000 tons of waste to landfills. Our goal, a stretch goal, is to reduce that amount to zero by 2017. In addition to recycling and eliminating the use of non-recyclable materials, we are exploring these options:
• Moving to paperless reporting by using electronic reports and e-mails to share information;
• Conducting waste stream audits to determine what materials are being disposed of, reviewing practices to determine if waste generation can be eliminated, and for those waste streams that cannot be eliminated, determining if any reuse or recycling alternatives are available; and
• Urging our suppliers to reduce or eliminate unnecessary packaging in their shipments to us.
In fact, several of our facilities have already achieved "zero landfill".
