At Thomson-Shore, we maintain our high quality standards by using recycled materials whenever possible and reusing or recycling post-production waste. Our recycling efforts have allowed us to reduce our environmental footprint considerably. Here's how we do it:
Company-wide initiatives:
- At every office desk, we use two waste receptacles, one for recyclable items and the other for non-recyclable trash.
- In our cafeteria, we use clearly marked receptacles for cans, plastic goods and paper trash.
- We use recycled (and re-recycle!) inkjet and laser printer cartridges.
- We have a recycling trailer available for employees to bring in recyclable materials from home.
In the manufacturing areas:
- 68% of titles we manufacture are printed on recycled paper.
- We recycle all post-production waste paper.
- We recycle all waste and unusable ink.
- We recycle all aluminum printing plates.
- We recycle all silver from our film developer, film scraps, and recycling of old titles.
- We recycle all waste sludge from our in-house solvent recycler.*
- We recycle all used oil.
- We use eco-safe lamps in our lighting.**
To sum it up, we reuse and recycle all materials whenever possible. Virtually 100% of our waste is recycled; anything that's not is consumed by process. We dare you to find a greener book manufacturer!
* Our solvent purchases have declined significantly since installing our solvent recycler and beginning to reuse process solvents.
** Only 40 old-style fluorescent lamps were hauled away last year. Two years ago Thomson-Shore switched the plant and office lighting to eco-safe lamps. These lamps are approved to be environmentally and ecologically safe.
