*NEWS*XEROX $1M GOES TO HELP FORESTS

[Anonymous]

$1M goes to help forests.
(NOV , 2006) — For the first time, Xerox Corp. has put all of its corporate citizenship efforts in one place for the world to examine.Xerox released its “2006 Report on Global Citizenship” Thursday, the debut of a report that charts everything from the company’s environmental emissions progress to its efforts to protect customer privacy.In conjunction with the release, the Xerox Foundation announced a $1 million grant to the Nature Conservancy to create a program to strengthen forest conservation efforts.”We see it not only as an opportunity to report on our progress, but to identify areas where we need to improve,” Chairman and Chief Executive Anne M. Mulcahy wrote in a letter accompanying the report. “As good as we may be today, we have to be even better tomorrow — and not by a little, but by a lot.”

Among the accomplishments Xerox cites:
# Reducing by 16 percent the amount of chemicals and particulates the company released into the air in 2005 vs. 2004.
# Diverting 107 million pounds of material from landfills through equipment remanufacturing and 14 million pounds through recycling.
# Employing a compound that causes the pellets used to make toner to break more readily during the grinding portion of manufacturing, which cuts the energy needed by 22 percent.
# Planning to develop a policy statement on human rights issues during the next year.
# Planning to begin a third-party auditing program in 2007 to ensure its suppliers are in compliance with an electronics industry code that monitors companies’ social responsibility.

In Monroe County, the company’s largest manufacturing location, Xerox reduced electricity consumption by 1 percent in 2005 and natural gas consumption 4 percent.The drop came even as Xerox opened the Gil Hatch Center for Customer Innovation and brought other workers to Webster, said Anne Stocum, manager of environmental market support.”We’re on a continuous improvement path,” Stocum said, adding that the company is installing a computerized system that can regulate energy use in Webster from a central location, which should further increase conservation.The Nature Conservancy program will work to develop tools that will help the paper industry better manage forests and maintain biodiversity, Stocum said.”It’s in Xerox’s best interest that the forests of the world are still around and in good working order in 100, 200, 300 years.”That program encouraged Frank Regan, chairman of the Rochester regional chapter of the Sierra Club. Regan’s wife is a Xerox employee.”It’s really important to see businesses follow through their whole supply chain” to assess environmental impacts, he said. “I wish more businesses would do it.”

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November 2, 2006 at 2:28 PM