Facilities
As a member of the United States
Green Building Council <http://www.usgbc.org>, SanDisk has completed
a Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design for Existing
Buildings (LEED-EB) evaluation survey for its Milpitas, CA,
headquarters campus. We use this tool to maximize the operational
efficiency of our facilities while minimizing environmental
impacts.
SanDisk recognizes that reducing
energy and raw material consumption while improving efficiency is
the best way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and our impact on
the environment. Examples of these reductions can be seen at our
headquarters' campus where over 90% of the internal building
lighting systems are controlled by occupancy sensors. Additionally,
this site actively participates in an organized, proactive
demand-response program with the local energy supplier to mitigate
grid overload. Through this program we were able to curtail nearly
1 million kilowatts of energy use in 2010 and 2011.
Efforts that produce notable
results and prove to be cost-effective are extended to our
international locations for implementation. Our Shanghai, China,
test and assembly facility has implemented a wide variety of
environmental initiatives to significantly reduce water,
electricity and chemical consumption:
- We've reduced our use of sodium hydroxide by nearly 40 tons per
year and our consumption of hydrochloric acid by more than 26 tons
per year.
- We've cut our water consumption by 6,600 tons per year.
- We recently began a water-reclamation project in several areas
of the facility to further reduce our water consumption by more
than 375,000 cubic meters per year -- enough water to sustain
annually nearly 600 individuals.
- We are replacing fluorescent lamps with LED lighting, which
will lower our electricity consumption by 1.5 million
kilowatt-hours per year, equivalent to the amount of electricity
used annually by nearly 1,900 Shanghai residents.