WasteWise Partner

In October, 2008, SRI Surgical officially became recognized as a partner in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s program WasteWise.

Launched in 1994, WasteWise currently has over 2000 partners spanning more than 55 industry sectors. This voluntary program assists members in their efforts to increase waste prevention and recycling. Since its inception, WasteWise partners have reported more than 120 million tons of waste reduced and have made significant achievements reducing their impact on global climate change.

Becoming a WasteWise partner was a logical extension of SRI Surgical’s commitment to environmental savings. Since 1991, SRI Surgical has provided products and services that assist our healthcare clients in providing quality care, while being environmentally conscious. At our corporate facility and reprocessing plants, waste prevention and recycling programs continue to be a company focus, relative to SRI Surgical employees, customers, and the communities we serve. Reducing municipal waste, recycling and reuse of office and shipping materials, and continued donation of our reusable products to third world countries are the primary goals SRI Surgical has committed to as a WasteWise partner.

Use of this logo does not imply an endorsement by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.

http://www.epa.gov/epawaste/partnerships/wastewise/index.htm

Practice Greenhealth Member

SRI Surgical is a charter member of Practice Greenhealth.

Use of this logo does not imply an endorsement by Practice Greenhealth.

http://www.practicegreenhealth.org

Champion for Change Award

The Champion for Change award recognizes businesses and organizations that demonstrate successful accomplishments in "greening" their own organization and have assisted their associated healthcare facility clients/members/customers in improving their environmental performance.

Longstanding Commitment to Green

Implemented in 1991, SRI Surgical’s original design for reprocessing of surgical linen was based upon an environmentally friendly architecture that ensured a sustainable outcome over the years. Although early in the environmental movement, SRI Surgical’s design took into consideration the importance of efficient water management, energy saving strategies, environmentally friendly chemicals, and a sterilization approach which continues to be the gold standard, and is the least harmful to humans and the environment.

Throughout its history, SRI Surgical has evolved numerous technologies designed to strengthen the company’s commitment to social responsibility. For example, the use of SRI Surgical’s patented RFID tracking process allows for detailed control of all surgical linen products, minimizing the need for unnecessary, additional reprocessing – thus saving water, reducing chemical usage and conserving energy.

Environmentally friendly chemicals used throughout reprocessing cycles.
SRI Surgical’s proprietary wash formulas, specialized for each product type processed, minimize the impact to the environment. Each wash formula is unique and tailored to the specific products being processed, ensuring only the required amounts of chemicals and water are used to accomplish the task of appropriately cleaning and decontaminating the soiled products. Ongoing wash formula monitoring, titrations, and bioburden testing ensure that the wash formulas remain within tight control limits and are effective. Essentially, SRI Surgical applies a true manufacturing process based on Lean Manufacturing principles to ensure process quality and integrity. To further protect our world, SRI Surgical only purchases and uses products containing safer surfactants such as phosphate and NPE free chemicals.

Water management conserves precious resources.
A unique water management system allows 76% of all incoming water to be reclaimed and 43% of all processed water to be reused. Water management during the washing and rinsing processes is completely automated to operate with minimal human intervention. The last two clean rinses of each wash cycle become the first two flushes of the next cycle to conserve water usage. In addition, 100% of the water used in each sterilization cycle is reclaimed for use in other processes.

To protect the water treatment systems in the municipalities where our plants are located, the SRI Surgical process strips the heat from the waste water to reduce thermal shock to municipal water treatment systems. The waste water then passes through a micro-mesh rotary filter to remove particulates prior to entering the water treatment system.

Demonstrated energy conservation.
Conserving energy is vitally important to operating as an environmental friendly company. All SRI Surgical facilities are equipped with direct-fire water heaters that operate at 97% efficiency levels, which reduce natural gas usage by 35%. In a unique heat-exchange process, SRI Surgical strips energy from outgoing waste water. The company then uses this heat transfer to increase the temperature of the incoming water for the next cycles. This process reduces water heating costs by 40%-60%, reducing natural gas usage and thereby conserving energy.

Efficient and effective steam sterilization.
SRI Surgical utilizes steam sterilization for processing of all of its reusable surgical products. The environmental-friendly attributes of steam sterilization and the effectiveness and efficacy of this process have been established for many years. The SRI Surgical steam sterilization process is a validated process meeting the FDA mandated requirements for process control.

Waste avoidance achieves significant savings.
Recycling is a worthwhile endeavor, but those who are truly dedicated to environmental efforts recognize that the ultimate goal should be to avoid the creation of waste material in the first place. Strategies to deal with disposal of waste materials can never be as effective as simply choosing to not create excess waste which will negatively impact the environment. Through the use of reusable products, you can eliminate disposal costs associated with both the products used and the packaging associated with the products, including such items as cardboard, plastic, paper, and wooden pallets used for transport. Since 2000, SRI Surgical clients have made a conscious and responsible choice to not produce medical waste in the amount of more than 120,000,000 lbs of disposable gowns, back table covers, mayo stand covers, and drapes by utilizing SRI Surgical reusable products. Since 2000, SRI Surgical’s environmentally responsible customers also have avoided adding more than 44,730,000 lbs of packaging waste to our national waste stream.

SDSI Champion

Growing in our commitment to the environment, SRI Surgical has also made the choice to use safer detergents in our production environment. Many surfactants are harmful to aquatic life and do not break down into safer components. SRI Surgical has taken the initiative to research and remove these harmful surfactants from our processes. SRI Surgical only purchases and uses products containing safer surfactants such as phosphate and NPE free chemicals. As a result of these efforts, SRI Surgical has been recognized by the U.S. EPA as a recipient of their Champion Award in the Design for the Environment Program’s Safer Detergents Stewardship Initiative (SDSI). This is the EPA’s highest level of recognition under SDSI.

http://www.epa.gov/dfe/pubs/projects/formulat/sdsi.htm