ConocoPhillips Alaska began its relationship with Green Star many years ago when it was still ARCO Alaska. As ConocoPhillips, it has continued to be a strong supporter and example of a committed Green Star Awardee. When the company first received its Green Star Award, its major focus was to reduce costs through energy conservation at its downtown office building. Steps taken included removing extra lamps and installing reflectors in light fixtures to cut electrical usage by 60% while increasing light output; replacing incandescent bulbs with compact fluorescent lamps, yielding an annual savings of $45,000; and installing energy efficient boilers, savings another $100,000 in annual gas bills.
ConocoPhillips also provides subsidized bus passes to employees and provides designated parking for employee carpool vehicles. Paper use reduction also is a goal that ConocoPhillips has been working toward through introducing new technologies and changing old behaviors. Efforts include double-siding printed documents; eliminating some company-wide publications; eliminating the internal courier system through the introduction of email; and computerizing the purchasing system to reduce paperwork associated with invoicing, tracking, and payments. A records management effort is underway to reduce paper use that includes converting older paper records to microfiche, scanning engineering drawings and contracts, and using computer output microfiche, which involves never printing new documents but producing them directly as microfiche.
ConocoPhillips also recycles office paper, corrugated cardboard, newspaper, aluminum cans, and toner cartridges. In 1995, ConocoPhillips (then ARCO) provided a savings figure associated with recycling of $11,520.
In the past few years, efforts have been launched to recycle transparencies, Christmas cards, and collect used eyeglasses for donation to Habitat for Humanity. Surplus materials that still have value (e.g., computers, library collection) are donated to non-profit organizations around Anchorage. We have recently added environmental issues such as pollution prevention to the objectives of the ConocoPhillips Anchorage Safety Committee and incorporated our Anchorage facility into a successful North Slope employee recognition program (Earth Energy Partners).
In 1997, ARCO Alaska applied for and received Arctic Green Star awards for their Kuparuk and Prudhoe North Slope operations. In Kuparuk’s case, the Arctic Green Star recognized pollution prevention programs that had been ongoing at Kuparuk since the late 1980’s. These Kuparuk pollution prevention programs were subsequently recognized by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Interstate Oil and Gas Compact Commission. ConocoPhillips Alaska, Inc. continues to strive for and achieve Green Star awards for our facilities located everywhere in Alaska.
ConocoPhillips Alaska, Inc. http://www.conocophillipsalaska.com
