A Leader for the Environment

21.10.2011

Company-wide policies designed to ensure Mercury Marine is environmentally responsible and protective of the earth's natural resources are delivering very significant benefits. 

"As the world's largest manufacturer of marine engines and with 5,000 employees worldwide, Mercury Marine is very aware of its environmental responsibilities," said John Temple, General Manager for the Australian, New Zealand and the Pacific region. "Being big means you can make a big difference. 

"While sustainable actions have been integral to our business practices for a long time, we recently acted so they could be fully organised and properly measured."

The results of that measurement are contained in Mercury Marine's 2011 Company Sustainability Report.

Among the findings: 

Smart energy practices have helped to significantly reduce natural gas and electricity use in the US between 2005 and 2010 - from approximately 1700 billion BTU (British Thermal Units) to less than 1100 billion. 

• For four consecutive years, Mercury US has achieved its goal of reducing energy consumption by 34 billion BTU annually. Improving factory heating, ventilation and air-conditioning has had a significant impact, as has the updating of foundry processes and equipment.
• From 2005 to 2010, Mercury Marine's water usage in the US has been cut from 260 million gallons a year to just over 110 million (984 million litres to 378 million) thanks to recycle and reuse practices.
• Mercury Marine has developed a family of aluminium die-cast alloys which can be recycled for almost any foundry use, saving Mercury Marine alone 139 million kilowatt hours of electricity a year and avoiding the production of 300 million pounds (136 million kgs) of carbon dioxide. 
• Production of hazardous waste has been reduced by 62% over the past six years by Mercury US.
• Mercury's US refurbishment program (unique among marine engine manufacturers) has returned 22,700 engines to service since 1996, saving them from the scrap heap. 

"You can tell by the size of these improvements that we are very serious about our environmental responsibilities and the company has established some very tough goals which we have to achieve by 2015," Mr Temple said. 

"In fact we're implementing a scorecard which ensures that every new product is more efficient than the one it replaces. By 2015 we want overall emissions from our engines to be about a third of what they were in 2005. That's a huge goal but we're the best at what we do and I have no doubt we'll make it."