Our Commitment to Sustainability and Enhancing Human Health & Well-Being

Waters Staff

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sustainability

Earth Day represents an opportunity to take stock of our impact on our environment and to commit to taking steps to leave our communities in which we work and live better than we found them. Waters has committed to a series of 2025 Sustainability Goals, which are discussed in detail in our most recent Sustainability Report.

Simultaneously, several additional activities are currently taking place at Waters facilities around the world. I’ve expanded on a few examples below. In many cases, these are grassroots initiatives, driven by employees who found opportunities to leverage Waters’ entrepreneurial culture in order to positively impact the company, the communities we serve, and the environment.

Sustainability in service operations

We believe that sustainable activities inspire innovation and contribute to operational excellence, so we try to integrate sustainable thinking and practice into our strategy, operations, and products.

  • We are beginning the process to convert our US service vehicle fleet to hybrid and electric vehicles to reduce the environmental impact of our service operations. We plan to replace approximately 30 vehicles per year and expect to have 50% of our US service fleet vehicles be hybrid or electric by the end of 2025.
  • We have introduced augmented reality technology to facilitate remote instrument troubleshooting and calibration work, helping to both reduce service call travel and ensure the safety of our employees and customers during the COVID-19 pandemic
  • Through our product trade-in programs, we have recovered nearly eight tons of steel (sold to metal recyclers for repurposing in other contexts) and certain additional components (recovered and refurbished for reuse as appropriate)

Energy, waste, and water management

Through our commitment to sustainability, we actively seek ways to measure, manage, and commit to reductions in our environmental footprint in all areas of operation.

  • Our Global Indirect Procurement team has gone paperless for supplier contracts across all sites. We expect that this will reduce the Global Indirect Procurement’s paper use by 50%.
  • At the TA Instruments headquarters in New Castle, Delaware, we inspect shipping pallets and packaging materials from incoming deliveries and, wherever possible, reuse them for outgoing intracompany shipments
  • Several Waters facilities have installed dishwashers in their break rooms which consume less water and energy than handwashing dishes and which have led to a reduction in disposable cup, cutlery, and dishware use

Global employee commitment to sustainability

At Waters facilities around the globe, our deep legacy of problem-solving and commitment to enhance human health and well-being extends to how our employees approach sustainability and addressing environmental concerns.

In our Wexford, Ireland facility:

  • An employee-led Green Team is dedicated to identifying and leading activities to reduce the facility’s environmental impact
  • Since 2018, this team has hosted several site-wide events, partnering with experts and local businesses to raise awareness of environmental issues and to educate employees on personal environmental footprint reduction

At TA Instruments in New Castle, Delaware:

  • For more than 10 years, employees have donated discarded toner cartridges and mobile phones to a local electronics recycler, with funds from the sale of recovered materials benefitting local charities

In our facility in Brasov, Romania:

  • Computers, books, and clothing are collected for donation and then distributed to local charities and schools
  • Site management provides employees with contacts to responsibly dispose of and recycle household items that are not appropriate for disposal in the general waste stream, including chemicals, cooking oil, batteries, and CFL bulbs

Inspiring innovation and advancing scientific progress with sustainability

Our commitment to sustainability, centered on advancing scientific progress to enhance human health and well-being, is at the core of what our products and services achieve. And, it’s at the center of how we operate around the world.

The activities described above are just a sample of how we are working to reduce our environmental footprint and improve the communities in which we live and work. Watch for future updates, as well as this year’s Sustainability Report.

As Waters expands its sustainability program, we will work to identify best practices in individual facilities that can be applied throughout our operation and will continue to seek input from our internal and external stakeholders.

Learn more about our commitment to sustainability

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