Hill Laboratories achieves Enviro-Mark Diamond

Hill Laboratories has a commitment to conduct it's business in an environmentally friendly way and the lab continues to go from strength to strength with the achievement of Enviro-Mark Diamond certification. In the recent audit, the Clyde St Laboratory jumped two levels to the top level of the Enviro-Mark management programme.

The Enviro-Mark programme assists companies to develop an Environmental Management System (EMS) by working through the 5 levels, Bronze through to Diamond. The end result is the company has a system to improve its environmental practice, raise the bar and to seek continuous improvement. The next step is further embedding the culture into the company.

“Diamond certification isn't the end of our journey” says Lucy Hodgson, Environmental Health & Safety Manager, “it's the beginning. It's our company's way of saying we are committed to protecting the environment and minimising the impacts our business may have on the environment; and in that we are willing to adapt our business practice where possible”.

Hill Laboratories joined the Enviro-Mark programme three years ago, after recognising the benefits of sustainability. Not only does the programme encourage us to look at our current operations from a environmentally sustainable way, we potentially become more efficient and profitable in the way that we operate our business.

A recent example of this commitment is the change in some plastic products used in the lab. The new high grade plastic ware ensures quality results for customers, while after use these consumables can be returned to the supplier, recycled and used as lower grade plastic in other applications outside of Hills.

While there is potential to seek further changes in the plastics we use in the laboratory, we are also looking to work with other companies to meet our goal of recycling all plastics that enter the lab.

If you want to find out more about the Enviro-Mark program visit the Enviro-Mark website at www.enviro-mark.co.nz/