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Stewardship of Natural Resources
APS adheres to 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 strive to incorporate this thinking into every aspect of operations, from making environmentally sensitive purchasing decisions to promoting reuse and recycling efforts. Our systems are being integrated to help manage purchasing, chemical use and reuse of company equipment. Our in-house chemical review team is responsible for 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 the types and quantities of chemicals purchased and stored. These two systems allow us to create baselines to more effectively plan and set goals.
In 2003, APS joined two EPA partnerships programs - WasteWise and Coal Combustion Products Partnerships (C2P2). Wastewise is a voluntary EPS program through which organizations work to minimize solid waste. C2P2 is a cooperative efforts between the EPA and the industry to help promote the beneficial use of C2P2 and the environmental benefits which can result.
Chemical Use Reduction
Under our company programs, every chemical used is tracked, from purchase through disposal. Our company requires 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 revenue generation.
APS continually tries to reduce the number of approved hazardous chemicals the company uses. In 1997, we had a total of 6,881 chemicals listed in our MSDS database system. In 2003, we had 4,706 chemicals listed in our MSDS database, compared with 4,162 in 2002 and 4,234 in 2001. This slight increase was due to the opening of our new Redhawk and Silverhawk power plants.
Material Re-use
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 $45,500 in savings in 2003.
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