Responsibility is one of our core values, and one way we demonstrate this is through our commitment to 100% compliance with local, regional and national environmental laws and regulations.
Maintaining compliance demonstrates to our stakeholders that we are respectful of the law and the permits that have been established to preserve the natural environment we all share and ensures our ongoing license to operate. As of 2023, 95% of our operating sites have externally certified environmental management systems, and we are nearing our 2025 sustainability goal of 100% of our operating facilities being certified by an external party.
Our Billerica, MA, USA and Carrollton, KY, USA facilities as well as our Zhuhai, China plant have recently received Responsible Care® Management System certification – achieving a new milestone of having 100% of operating sites in the United States and China certified to the internationally recognized Responsible Care 14001 management standard. As part of the intensive multi-day Responsible Care audit process, both our Billerica and Carrollton sites were also found to have zero non-conformances.
Our Cilegon, Indonesia plant is the most recent site to achieve ISO 14001 certification. These third-party certifications ensure we have a rigorous system in place to continuously improve our management practices and mitigate potential environmental impacts and compliance deviations.
Complying with environmental regulations is a deeply embedded value in our day-to-day practices. We define environmental non-conformances (ENCs) as events resulting in a reportable spill or release, a notice of violation, a public complaint or a permit deviation deemed to be significant. Across all our sites, our ENCs continue to decline, with a reduction of more than 70% over the last three years.
We are committed to designing and operating our facilities in a manner that helps to ensure the preservation of biodiversity. As such, we have initiated a process to better understand our nature-related dependencies, impacts, risks and opportunities. In alignment with the newly published Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) recommendations, our initial phase of work is focused on identifying potential nature-related issues by screening our direct operations for their proximity to sensitive locations such as Key Biodiversity Areas, Nature2000 and UNESCO World Heritage sites. This first step will enable us to develop evaluation criteria and pilot site assessments to inform future planning for the emerging topic of biodiversity protection.
View our latest sustainability report to learn about our progress and goals.
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