Reducing the Impact of our Operations

Energy use is a significant and rising expense at Millipore and our main source of environmental impact, so using this resource wisely has both financial and environmental benefits. Our approach to energy management is three-fold:

Improving efficiency

We continually seek opportunities to conserve energy by streamlining our processes and introducing new technologies. Through periodic energy audits, we assess our progress.

Lights at the center of the aisle are automatically shut off after 12 or 20 minutes of inactivity; fixtures at the end of the aisle remain on for safety.

For example, in our Burlington, Massachusetts warehouse, we replaced all existing 400-Watt metal halogen lights with energy-efficient 235-Watt T5 fluorescent lights. Each light fixture is equipped with a motion sensor and is set to automatically turn off either 20 or 12 minutes after no movement is registered, depending on the area. The new fixtures are much brighter, issuing 235 foot-candle measured four feet off the floor vs. 80 to 150 that the old fixtures would issue.

We expect this change to save Millipore approximately $70,000 per year and reduce our electricity usage by 500,000 kWh/year. Some unexpected benefits include easy identification of areas that are not frequently used (lights remain off most of the time) and reducing picking errors.

Alternative energy sources

This includes both clean generation of energy on-site and through our existing energy providers. For example, we use a natural gas fired cogeneration plant at our facility in Cork, Ireland. Generating energy on-site is environmentally preferable and increases efficiency because

It avoids the power loss that occurs when transmitting electricity over long distances;
It uses waste heat from power generation for process heating demand; and
Natural gas is cleaner to burn and releases less carbon dioxide than coal or oil.

Green buildings

We design and renovate company buildings to reduce energy use and also decrease other environmental impacts (see the Green Buildings section).

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