Environment
Stewardship for today, preservation for tomorrow
Overview
SAS strives to be a leader in environmental sustainability. From U.S. headquarters to our offices around the world, SAS is committed to making a difference. This year saw the installation of new solar arrays, completion of a new cloud computing facility designed to responsibly expand computing capacity and achieve high-level Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification from the US Green Building Council, and continued efforts to manage water consumption, waste and energy efficiency intelligently.
Highlights from 2010 at Cary, NC world headquarters included:
- Activation of Solar Farm II, a 1.2 megawatt addition to our solar farms.
- Installation of building rooftop solar thermal hot water system.
- Completion of reclaimed water line from the local utility to data center cooling towers.
- Almost doubling the amount of operational waste diverted from landfills.
- Diverting 81 percent of new construction and major renovation waste from landfills.
- Registration of three buildings striving for LEED certification.
- Addition of numerous environmentally-friendly and energy efficient technologies in new and existing buildings.
In addition to employing various sustainability measures at the Cary world headquarters and global operations, SAS takes pride in supporting environmental education and awareness efforts. We regularly engage employees and the communities where we operate with active dialogue about the environment. In 2010, SAS supported numerous environmental speaking engagements, visits to the SAS solar farms, companywide Earth Day celebrations, featured articles posted on the internal green website, published white papers and webcasts. By engaging with customers, employees, industry leaders and world leaders, SAS seeks to extend the reach of our sustainability initiatives.
SAS did not receive any sanctions or fines in 2010 for noncompliance with environmental laws and regulations in the United States.
Green Buildings
This year, SAS completed a new 38,660-square-foot cloud computing facility at our Cary, NC world headquarters. The building was designed with highly efficient mechanical and electrical systems, including a cooling system that will use reclaimed water and water-side economizers that allow for heat removal without utilizing the building chillers.
Over the past decade, the challenge of delivering timely information in support of enterprise analytics has increased exponentially. The deployment of additional computing and storage solutions, combined with IT globalization at corporate headquarters, has increased demand for energy and data center space. Existing facilities were reaching capacity and could not be efficiently expanded to maintain the high-level support expected by our customers. The solution was to design and construct a dedicated computing facility, emphasizing efficiency, flexibility and sustainability. Collaboration with industry-recognized engineering experts has put us on a successful path to achieve LEED certification. Cary headquarters highlights from 2010 included:
- Expected energy consumption reduction of 32.8 percent.
- When fully utilized, annual savings of 6.8 million kilowatt hours are anticipated.
- Expected 30 percent water reduction from high-efficiency mechanical systems and 40.2 percent reduction in ancillary use from low-flow technologies.
- 20.9 percent of the building’s materials have been manufactured from recycled content.
- Flywheel system eliminates battery replacement and yields lower cost of ownership compared to UPS battery systems.
- Construction of facility achieved 75.2 percent waste diversion from landfill.
- Old-growth trees adjacent to building were saved by making use of soil nailing system that allowed embankment cuts without excessive disruption to environment.
- Annual energy savings are equivalent to a reduction of 3,600 CO2e tonnes.
The new data center provides opportunities to use robust measurements to make proactive IT selection decisions – minimizing IT inefficiencies. With the completion of the new facility, we were able to retire an older, less efficient data center and utilize this space to meet demand for additional employee offices. We were also able to consolidate IT equipment in other locations and ultimately retire 20 percent of our IT assets.
The construction of a new office building, also designed to achieve LEED certification, will house an Executive Briefing Center to be completed in early 2011. This building is designed to help conserve water and energy, by employing features such as a rainwater capture system that provides water for restrooms, thermal slab floor cooling, radiant floor heating, regenerative drive elevators and solar-generated hot water and electricity. With approximately 280,000 square feet, this building will house 690 offices, two auditoria, meeting rooms and a full-service cafeteria. Through December, 82 percent of construction waste was diverted from landfill and recycled.
We replaced the roof on our largest building at Cary, NC world headquarters (386,225 square feet) with a white reflective membrane. White rooftops reflect sunlight, which reduces heat transfer to the building and minimizes cooling load. The new roof has greater insulation, which will help to reduce energy consumption for the building. The roof replacement generated 4.92 tons of debris, of which 79 percent was recycled.
SAS is also embracing LEED guidelines for remodeling and retrofit of existing buildings. Since LEED design is currently recognized only in the US and Canada, SAS offices in other countries are working to incorporate country-specific best practices and pursue equivalent certifications for new construction projects and maintenance of existing buildings.
| 2010 Goals | Performance Highlights | 2011 Goals |
|---|---|---|
| Continue to apply LEED best practices on construction of Building C and cloud computing facility in 2010. Achieve LEED certification for the two new SAS buildings, under construction, by 2011. Maintain Q1 2011 completion date for environmentally-friendly constructed office building. |
Completed construction of 38,660-square foot cloud computing facility:
|
Achieve LEED New Construction certification for cloud computing facility. Achieve LEED New Construction certification Building C. |
| Review the Strategic US Headquarters Plan annually and continue to incorporate LEED principals to operational procedures | SAS continues to proactively maintain, repair and retrofit existing facilities to best practice guidelines recommended by the US Green Building Council. (See goals for existing building LEED certifications) | |
| Baseline at least one existing building for consideration of LEED certification. Register existing building for LEED Existing Building: Operations and Maintenance (EBOM) certification |
SAS completed evaluation of existing building at US headquarters and is pursuing LEED Existing Building: Operations and Maintenance (EBOM) certification. Registered existing building for EBOM certification. |
Register five owned facilities for EBOM certification. Register two non-US offices for EBOM certification. |
Water
SAS' 900-acre campus in Cary used 117,763 cubic meters of municipal water and approximately 51,292 cubic meters of ground water from 15 wells in 2010. For 13 other owned facilities worldwide, SAS used 53,381 cubic meters of municipal water in 2010.
| 2010 Goals | Performance Highlights | 2011 Goals |
|---|---|---|
| Implement a Strategic Campus Plan directive for retrofitting existing bathrooms with low-flow plumbing. | Renovated nine restrooms in major office buildings at Cary campus headquarters with low-flow technologies. | Renovate 12 restrooms in major office buildings at Cary headquarters with low-flow technologies. |
| Install plumbing infrastructure to connect water utility’s reclaimed water line to at least one building in 2010. | Completed installation of reclaimed water line to cloud computing facility. The building will eventually use up to 20 million gallons of reclaimed water in its cooling towers annually. | Supplant 5 million gallons of potable water to cloud computing facility cooling towers with reclaimed water. Connect reclaimed water line to additional building on campus. Projected annual usage of 11 million gallons. |
| Implement a rainwater capture system for one office building at SAS world headquarters. | Completed installation of rainwater capture system for office building at SAS world headquarters. | Report water capture and building use for system. |
| Replace two antiquated building cooling towers with higher-efficiency models designed to use less water and accept reclaimed water as alternative. |
| Source | 2009 | 2010 | Variance | Percent |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US Ground Water | 39,600 | 51,292 | 11,692 | 30% |
| US Municipal Water | 142,471 | 151,438 | 8,967 | 6% |
| US Reclaimed Water | 62 | 175 | 113 | 182% |
| Global Offices Municipal Water | 71,866 | 83,525 | 11,659 | 16% |
| Global Rainwater Capture & Reuse | 954 | 1,003 | 49 | 5% |
| Global Surface Water | 151 | 151 | 0 | 0% |
| Totals | 255,104 | 287,585 | 32,481 | 13% |
- Added 38,660-square feet of building space to Cary headquarters.
- SAS added office space following the acquisitions of MEMEX and VSTI.
- Construction of new building and establishing new landscaping.
- Added 165 new employees at Cary headquarters.
- Expanded cooling needs for increased data center capacity in new and existing facilities.
- Completion of reclaimed water line from the local utility to the new data center in Cary’s Building D. The building will eventually use up to 20 million gallons of reclaimed water in its cooling towers annually. When the water line is connected to the cooling towers at Building R, another 11 million gallons of reclaimed water will be put to use.
- Renovated nine bathrooms with low-flow plumbing technologies.
- Installed rainwater capture system in new building at Cary campus headquarters. The system uses two 20,000-gallon cisterns to collect rainwater from the building roof. Rainwater capture is UV disinfected and used to supply non-potable water to the low-flow bathroom flushing fixtures.
Using reclaimed water and rain water reduces our impact on local reservoirs and minimizes the amount of energy needed by the water utility to treat waste water to potable quality.
Water Consumption
Energy and Emissions
SAS continues to be innovative in energy efficiency. This year, we installed thermal slab floor cooling and radiant floor heating in the new Executive Briefing Center, which will open in 2011. Thermal slab floor cooling uses water cooled in off-peak hours by building chillers to help maximize air conditioning efficiencies. The cooled water runs through pipes in concrete slabs to help cool the building during the day and minimize electricity use when rates are highest. The radiant flood heating system is situated in a building with large atrium space to maintain heat near occupants at the floor and reduce heat loss through the roof. This system maintains occupant comfort and minimizes heating required in open areas.
SAS continues to implement LEED guidelines and best practices in the pursuit of formal certification for new and existing buildings, as well as leased and owned office renovations. SAS has expanded use of energy-efficient lighting technologies such as LED, fluorescent and metal halides.
This year also saw the completion of our second solar farm on the company’s campus. Solar Farm II – situated on approximately seven acres adjacent to the first five-acre farm – has a 1.2-MW capacity and will produce an estimated 1.9 million kWh each year. It comprises 5,236 ground-mounted photovoltaic (PV) panels. The system incorporates a RayTracker tracking system that rotates the assembly for maximum sun exposure, increasing energy capture by up to 25 percent over fixed systems and reducing acreage requirements. No trees were cut down to build the farm, and we eliminated the need for concrete support by driving steel posts into compacted soil. To maintain the grass under the panels, sheep inhabit the 12 acres to keep them manicured and fertilized.
| 2010 Goals | Performance Highlights | 2011 Goals |
|---|---|---|
| Install an additional 1.2 megawatts of solar photovoltaic capacity to the existing solar farm. | Activated a 1.2-megawatt capacity solar array at world headquarters (Solar Farm II/August 2010) that produces an additional 1.9 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of renewable energy. Combined with the 2009 Solar Farm 1, the arrays generate more than 3.6 million kWh annually. |
Install an additional 1.0 megawatt of solar photovoltaic capacity to the existing solar farm. |
| Install at least one solar photovoltaic system on an office building rooftop. | Began installation of rooftop photovoltaic (PV) system for one office building on Cary headquarters. Installation completed early 2011. | Complete installation and activation of solar PV rooftop system. Install solar PV system on one additional building rooftop at Cary headquarters. Install solar thermal hot water system for one additional campus building. |
| Install at least two electric vehicle charging stations. | ||
| Purchase plug-in electric vehicles for fleet operations in 2012. | ||
| Deploy custom energy scorecards and dashboards to all globally owned offices. | ||
| Decommission approximately 7,000 square feet of older, less efficient data center space and consolidate services in cloud computing facility. |
| Region | 2009 | 2010 | Variance | 2010 Contribution |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Asia Pacific | 32,436 | 30,777 | -5% | 6% |
| Canada | 7,720 | 7,808 | 1% | 2% |
| EMEA | 97,424 | 104,931 | 8% | 21% |
| Latin America | 3,083 | 3,083 | 0% | 1% |
| US Data Center | 89,397 | 94,995 | 6% | 19% |
| United States, excludes Data Center | 234,167 | 264,685 | 13% | 52% |
| All Regions | 464,228 | 506,280 |
In 2010, SAS consumed 150,457 GJ of energy, compared to 127,632 GJ in 2009 for direct fuels used in support of global fleet and building operations.
| 2010 | 2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kilowatt Hours (kWh) | 61,238,828 | 57,890,219 | 55,652,476 | 53,408,077 | 50,877,744 |
| Revenue (US $Billion) | $2.43 | $2.31 | $2.26 | $2.15 | $1.90 |
| kWh Growth | 4.0 percent | 4.0 percent | 4.2 percent | 5.0 percent | 2.7 percent |
| Efficiency: $ Earned Per 1 kWh | 39.7 | 39.9 | 40.61 | 40.26 | 37.34 |
| Efficiency: kWh Consumed Per $1 Earned | 0.025 | 0.025 | 0.025 | 0.025 | 0.027 |
Managing Greenhouse Gas Emissions
SAS completed the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Supply Chain questionnaire related to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions inventory and related climate change management in response to customer requests. SAS' overall score was 65 out of 100, up from 56 last year and well above the average of 45.| Source | 2009 Contributions | 2010 Contributions | Variance | 2010 Contribution | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Scope 1 | Scope 2 | Scope 1 | Scope 2 | Scope 1 | Scope 2 | 2009 | 2010 | |
| Asia Pacific | 1 | 6,528 | 1 | 6,162 | 17% | 6% | 6,529 | 6,163 |
| Canada | 122 | 286 | 99 | 314 | 19% | -10% | 408 | 413 |
| EMEA | 2,745 | 5,527 | 3,017 | 6,037 | -10% | -9% | 8,272 | 9,055 |
| Latin America | 0 | 177 | 0 | 177 | 0% | 0% | 177 | 177 |
| US Data Center | 0 | 15,548 | 0 | 15,722 | 0% | -1% | 15,548 | 15,722 |
| United States, excludes data center | 5,525 | 19,899 | 7,187 | 21,676 | -30% | -9% | 25,424 | 28,864 |
| Totals | 8,394 | 47,963 | 10,305 | 50,088 | -23% | -4% | 56,357 | 60,392 |
Waste
| 2010 Goals | Performance Highlights | 2011 Goals |
|---|---|---|
| Continue working to establish a waste management baseline. | Established program to track waste and recycling volumes for Cary headquarters. | Expand program to measure globally owned offices. |
| Expand the Eco Advocate program to incorporate a sponsored volunteer philanthropy program. | SAS expanded the Eco Advocate program to include volunteer options outside of SAS business. | Expand participation to US regional and global offices. |
| Set reduction targets and report on performance for SAS headquarters. | Continued to establish and expand material volumes included in baseline for waste management program. | Increase volume of materials diverted from landfill by 10 percent. |
| Conduct intensive recycling effort at Cary headquarters to “clean house” prior to opening of new building. | ||
| Add two new initiatives to increase recycling options for Eco Advocates. | ||
| Develop reporting to measure waste by building. |
As in 2009 and detailed below, SAS continued investment in Waste Management Program initiatives to reduce waste and encourage recycling at its facilities.
Overall volumes for recycling increased in 2010 due to an increased focus on the treatment of operational and construction waste, a campus-wide cleanup to prepare for the 2011 opening of Building C, increased participation from the Eco Advocate employee volunteer program, and employee awareness campaigns.
- 41 percent of total waste volume at campus headquarters was recycled in 2010, up from 22 percent in 2009.
- 100 percent of e-waste achieved
- Commingled materials increased by over 200,000 lbs.
- Cardboard recycling increased by 567,000 lbs.
- Recycling of books and paper increased by 250 percent from 2009.
- 81 percent of waste volume for new construction and major renovation projects at Cary headquarters was diverted from landfill
- Construction totals for Building D – 75 percent recycled.
- Construction totals for Building C – 82 percent recycled.
- Completed replacement of office building roof renovation project with white reflective membrane. Rooftop replacement generated 4.92 tons of debris, 79 percent of which was recycled.
| Type and Disposal Method | 2009 lbs | Percent of Total | 2010 lbs | Percent of Total | 2010-2009 Variance | Percent Variance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Operational waste recycled | 461,422 | 22% | 1,321,434 | 41% | 860,012 | 186% |
| Operational waste sent to landfill | 1,538,880 | 74% | 1,818,981 | 57% | 280,101 | 18% |
| Waste mulched & composted | 80,950 | 4% | 56,370 | 2% | -24,580 | -30% |
While procurement and environmental education are not material issues this year for SAS, we have continued efforts to determine a baseline for eco-friendly procurement and aim to increase volume of green material procurement by 10 percent.
SAS takes pride in its education and awareness efforts on environmental issues. We engaged in a yearlong campaign of education and communication through speaking engagements, visits to the SAS solar farms, a companywide event for Earth Day, featured articles posted on the internal green website, published white papers and webcasts.
