Two Performance Track Members Receive White House Awards

The Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) in Richland, Washington, and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in Golden, Colorado-two U.S. Department of Energy facilities that are members of EPA's National Environmental Performance Track program-have been selected as recipients of the 2006 White House Closing the Circle Awards. The awards recognize outstanding achievements of federal employees and their facilities for efforts that result in significant contributions to environmental stewardship. The awards focus on waste prevention, recycling, and green purchasing activities under a variety of executive orders.

Sixteen winners and 11 honorable mentions were selected in 2006 from nearly 200 nominations. PNNL received a Waste/Pollution Prevention award for its efforts to integrate waste minimization and pollution prevention processes and tools into the laboratory's Environmental Management System (EMS). PNNL and its partners avoided more than $2 million in purchasing and waste disposal costs during fiscal year 2005 through activities such as reduction, reuse, and recycling of equipment, chemicals, office products and construction materials.

NREL received an honorable mention for its "Sustainable NREL" initiative, an innovative approach to EMS that integrates major sustainability goals and existing efforts at the laboratory that support sustainability-such as environmentally sensitive purchasing, a recycling program, a pollution prevention program, the greening of NREL's electricity, and the design of sustainable lab buildings-under one management umbrella.

For more information on the awards, please visit the Closing the Circle 2006 Award Winners website.

Two Performance Track Members Receive White House Awards

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