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Stewardship of Natural Resources
Pinnacle West promotes a specific and focused vision for recycling, source reduction and conservation of natural resources, including:
- Reduced consumption of virgin materials through product or process redesign
- Water conservation
- Energy conservation
- Habitat conservation
- Risk reduction
- Procurement of goods with recycled content
- Recycling solid waste
- Recycling hazardous waste and toxic materials
Our employees work hard to incorporate this thinking into every aspect of our operations, from making environmentally sensitive purchasing decisions to promoting reuse and recycling efforts. Our systems are integrated to help manage purchasing, chemical use and reuse of company equipment. Our in-house chemical review teams are charged with examining and approving chemical purchases.
Our purchasing and inventory system, called Materials Logistics Information System (MLIS), allows us to better manage purchasing and inventory activities and increase employee awareness of purchasing practices. We also use our electronic Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) system in conjunction with the MLIS program to facilitate tracking and reporting of the types and quantities of chemicals purchased and stored. The integration of the MLIS and MSDS systems allows us to create baselines to more effectively plan and set goals. As an example of the company’s commitment to purchasing products that are environmentally sound, the company switched to recycled copy paper in 2002.
Chemical Use Reduction
From purchase through disposal, every chemical used in our company is tracked. We require employees to follow specific practices when purchasing hazardous chemicals. Although we track chemical use in compliance with regulations, we also seek programs that will result in cost control, pollution prevention and, in some cases, revenue generation.
Reducing the number of approved hazardous chemicals is a priority. In 2002, we had a total of 4,234 products with chemicals listed in our MSDS database, compared with more than 10,000 in the mid-90s.
Material Reuse
Our materials exchange computer program provides a "marketplace" for employees and managers to post and shop for surplus materials rather than procuring new goods. Our employees completed exchanges that resulted in more than $73,000 in savings in 2002.
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