As a company focused on positively impacting our people, our communities, and the environment, Benchmark is committed to furthering our sustainability efforts across our entire global business operations. As a testament to this commitment, we are proud to have hosted our second annual Benchmark Environmental Challenge in 2023 and share key takeaways in this article.
The Benchmark Environmental Challenge
The annual Benchmark Environmental Challenge is a voluntary company-wide competition among our global manufacturing sites to reduce our global environmental impact by minimizing energy consumption, waste, and water withdrawals while promoting sustainable resource use.
The Benchmark Environmental Challenge fosters friendly competition by channeling each participating site's creative energies. Participants strive to develop innovative ideas to enhance Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG), and sustainability performance while reducing the overall environmental impact of our global operations. The competition is also one of the programs we have implemented to support the achievement of our greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reduction target. We are committed to reducing our absolute Scope 1 and Scope 2 GHG emissions by 15% by 2025 from a 2021 base year.
The many benefits this program offers to Benchmark, its employees and the local communities where Benchmark operates its facilities include:
- Utility reduction (e.g., energy, waste, water, etc.) usage at Benchmark locations worldwide.
- Further promotion of ESG and sustainability engagement across Benchmark
- Acknowledgement and recognition of site and employee efforts in our annual Sustainability Report
- Appreciation of measurable sustainability success indicators
The 2023 Competition and Results
We ran our annual global competition from May to December 2023 among Benchmark manufacturing sites to support our 2025 greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions target and to encourage increased environmental responsibility. Each participating site used measurable indicators to demonstrate the impact of their implemented environmental projects. Benchmark’s ESG/Sustainability Council and our ESG/Sustainability Steering Committee judged all entries, and the winners were announced and recognized during a global internal Town Hall meeting in February 2023. Eight manufacturing sites—and more than 5,000 employees—participated in this year’s challenge. The competition focused on minimizing energy consumption, waste, and water withdrawals while promoting sustainable resource use. As a result of the 45+ energy reduction projects implemented by the participants, significant reductions were achieved in electricity, natural gas, and water usage.
While each site made meaningful progress during the competition to help Benchmark achieve its sustainability goals, three sites stood out above the rest, delivering innovative and actionable ideas that reduced energy consumption, waste, and water withdrawal. The winners (listed below) of the 2023 Benchmark Environmental Challenge were selected based on their environmental impact reduction and cost savings:
- 1st place – Minnesota
- 2nd Place – Suzhou
- 3rd place – Penang Waterfront
- Honorable Mention – Ayutthaya, Guadalajara, Korat, Santa Ana, and Tijuana
Congratulations to our winning sites for their ingenuity and dedication to improving Benchmark’s environmental efforts within their site and worldwide.
Continuous Effort to Make the World a Better Place
Benchmark creates innovative ways to reduce our environmental impact and promote sustainability to make the world a better place. In just its second year, our Benchmark Environmental Challenge has proven to be a great accelerator to achieving our goals in environmental stewardship. Once again, we sincerely thank this year's participants, we congratulate this year's winners, and we look forward to kicking off our 2024 Benchmark Environmental Challenge next month.
To learn more about the Benchmark Environmental Challenge and our continued sustainability achievements, please read our 2023 Sustainability Report.
