Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The cry for sustainable industry has emerged as industrial manufacturing process emissions poison the air we breathe, disrupt food chains, damage vegetation, and contaminate soils. Industrial wastewater is often returned directly to streams and rivers. Elevated levels of suspended solids and metals lead to water quality problems and potential risks to public health. The temperature and pH of effluent can also negatively impact the biological and chemical oxygen demand of living systems, damaging the global ecosystem.
Clean air and water acts were established in the 1970s to enforce reductions of harmful air emissions and water pollutants, with a particular focus on global climate change subsequently, but mainly to address acid rain. Interface targets beyond compliance to eliminate all toxic releases into air and water from our facilities around the world.
Interface Inc. was founded on what were then revolutionary ideas and introduced technologies and products scarcely heard of in the global commercial interior market. Over time, we have experienced growth through both strategic alignments and the acquisition of many companies. Interface has manufacturing facilities on four continents and sales offices in 110 countries.
Our current goal is to be the first name in industrial ecology worldwide. It means creating the technologies of the future—kinder, gentler, and responsible technologies that emulate nature's systems. We are completely re-imaging and redesigning everything we do, including the way we define our business. We are creating a company that addresses the needs of society and the environment by developing a system of industrial production that decreases our costs and dramatically reduces the burdens placed upon living systems.
Industrialism developed in a time of fewer people, less materialism, and plentiful natural resources. What emerged was a highly productive, take-make-waste industrial system that assumed indefinite supplies of resources and infinite sinks in which to place our industrial waste.
Although the capacity to move mountains of material with a resultant lifestyle used to be desirable, today just the opposite is true: the rate of material throughput is endangering our prosperity, not enhancing it. At Interface we recognize that we are part of the problem. In order to reduce the amount of material we take and the waste we create, we first need to analyze all our material flows—everything that comes in and goes out. Only then can we begin to address the task at hand.
Our experience with sustainability has shown that the cure to resource waste is profitable, creative, and practical. This also makes precious resources available for the billions of people who need more. For us, sustainability is not the veritable low-hanging fruit of recycling or changing light bulbs, although those are certainly important steps; what we call the next industrial revolution is a momentous shift in how we see the world, how we operate within it, which systems will prevail, and which will not.
While there is no one solution to the impact we now have on earth and its ecosystems, the company shares one vision: to lead the way to the next industrial revolution of the 21st century. We realize it's a daunting task, but it's making us competitive today and sustaining us for future growth.
Interface has laid out a path designed to achieve sustainability on seven ambitious fronts.
The first is to eliminate waste. The first step to sustainability, QUEST—quality utilizing employees' suggestions and teamwork—is Interface's campaign to eliminate the concept of waste, not just incrementally reduce it.
Second is benign emissions, a prioritized focus on eliminating emissions that have negative or toxic effects on natural systems. Interface has identified 192 stacks as point sources for air pollution in North America, Europe, and Asia. Although all Interface companies comply with current environmental regulation, our goal is to move beyond compliance and eliminate emissions completely. Interface's Cool Carpet products carry climate-neutral third party certification, negating greenhouse gas emissions throughout the life cycle of the product.
Third is renewable energy, reducing the energy demands of Interface processes while substituting non-renewable sources with sustainable ones.
Fourth is closing the loop, redesigning Interface processes and products into cyclical material flows.
Fifth is resource-efficient transportation, exploring methods to reduce the transportation of both materials and people.
Sixth is sensitivity hookup, creating a community within and around Interface that understands the functioning of natural systems and our impact on them.
Seventh is redesign of commerce, redefining commerce to focus on the delivery of service and value instead of the delivery of material, and engaging external organizations to create policies and market incentives that encourage sustainable practices.
In order to conquer the above seven fronts, a holistic manufacturing model was developed by Interface in 1994. This 12-year journey has brought reassuring success and double-digit business growth. We have seen profits grow, exports increase, increased employment, and elevated quality and performance of product, while experiencing renowned brand recognition.
In the last twelve years, some highlights of the Canadian facility's achievements include a total savings through sustainability efforts of $13 million U.S. and $299 million worldwide.
We eliminated nine out of eleven air emission stacks at Interface in Belleville, and we revoked the certificate issued by the Minister of the Environment.
There was 69% of fossil-fuel-based energy reduction, 64% greenhouse gas reduction, and 92% reduction of indoor air pollution from our products. We received the Ontario Lung Association acknowledgement through Movement for Clean Air Now, C.A.N. DO, until the program was discontinued two years ago.
In 2006 we switched to 100% renewable electricity through the purchase of renewable energy certificates.
We have a zero-effluent facility through elimination of all process-connected sewage pipes. Carpet industries are known for a heavy amount of effluent, but the facility in Belleville is zero effluent. There are no effluent pipes attached to any process.
Water usage is down by 93%, landfill use is down by 97%, and last year alone, 800,000 pounds of post-consumer carpet were recycled.
We have third party certification such as EcoLogo, EPP, climate-neutral, ISO 9001, and ISO 14001, etc.; employee awareness and incentive programs that reward sustainable practices; and above average employee pay increases.
In essence, a sustainable business model means doing well by doing good. We encourage the enactment of policy regulations and incentives to achieve clean air. We also encourage governments at all levels to use the leverages they have at their disposal—for example, greener procurement.
I thank you for this opportunity.