Sustainable Procurement

We’ve developed the following statement on sustainable procurement:

As part of its commitment to minimizing impacts on the environment and society while promoting sustainability through its business practices, WESTON is integrating environmental performance considerations into its evaluation criteria for selecting suppliers, subcontractors, and service providers to furnish materials, supplies, equipment, and services, whether for internal use or for project execution on behalf of its clients. These environmental performance considerations will include resource efficiency, use of renewable resources, life-cycle assessment, waste reduction, and pollution prevention.

One of the largest areas of impact for doing business is in travel. WESTON is initially addressing this impact in two ways: developing a WESTON online sustainable meetings planning tool and using enhanced tools for virtual meetings.

WESTON has installed video-conferencing equipment in eight locations to minimize the need for travel, particularly in the realm of global operations. More virtual meetings are planned for 2009.

WESTON is working on a planning tool for sustainable meetings, so that when face-to-face meetings are needed, the organizer can evaluate the carbon impact of the location and find the “greenest” venue.

In the interest of saving resources, WESTON utilizes WebEx to enhance conference calls and SharePoint sites to foster virtual teamwork. In 2008, the Army and Air Force Client Business Teams hosted a large-scale virtual WebEx and conference call, replacing a face-to-face meeting for approximately 30 people–a big savings in money and resources!