Gold Certification awarded

Armstrong World Industries has been awarded Gold Certification, in Sustainability Victoria's Waste Wise Program at the company's manufacturing plant in Braeside, Melbourne.

Both Armstrong's manufacturing plants at Braeside and Thomastown in Victoria are accredited as WasteWise facilities by Sustainability Victoria — a state government agency providing information and assistance on waste reduction initiatives.

The Waste Wise program originally recognised companies that showed strong environmental commitment such as landfill reduction, but has moved to a holistic approach. Now the consideration is on all environmental impacts, with a strong focus on greenhouse gas and water reductions.

Waste Wise certification is three-tiered: Bronze, Silver and Gold.

Bronze is awarded to companies which are developing emerging systems that demonstrate some awareness and have some programs in place; Silver is awarded to companies implementing systems that have strong environmental practices integrated into many of their functions and can show commitment to continuous improvement; Gold is awarded to organisations with established systems based on sound environmental practices and that also show supply chain management proactive practices directly related to corporate strategy, third-party accreditation and advanced abatement programs.

"While we are proud of our efforts in helping to protect the Australian environment, we are continuing with our major research and development program which examines other post consumer recycled waste products," said Mike Jenkins, Armstrong's vice-president South Asia.