Going Green

Digital Pix is in the midst of a continuing “Go Green” campaign. The ultimate goal driving our “Go Green” policy is the reduction of our energy footprint for the benefit of everyone. Although the amount of technology, energy, and supplies that are needed to make a composite is immense, Digital Pix is promising to reduce their consumption by reducing the amount and type of materials used in the production process. The end result is to virtually eliminate waste as a by-product of production and to implement through innovation using energy saving procedures to manufacture all of its products. All of our great employees have committed to search for ways to help, not just at work, but also at home. All of us working together can make a huge difference.

Progress towards our goal will be made, one baby step at a time; but in the end, all those baby steps strung together will have a large and lasting impact that we can all take pride in. The process for improvement is simple. Identify current areas of consumption. Examine the processes and materials consumed to seek more green alternatives. Explore alternative processes and material suppliers. Plan a change from the current methodologies and develop a timeline for implementation. Test new processes and materials. Execute a plan and keep to your timeline. And lastly, be prepared to backtrack should your plan fail. Often success or failure is only measured over time. Determining environmental impact is an inexact science; the best scientific minds disagree more often than not about what actions we should be taking to protect the environment.

Keep an Environmentally Friendly Building

• Adjust Temp When the Building Is Empty: Our Digital Pix building itself has become a more environmentally-friendly building. The building’s temperature is controlled by a programmable thermostat to assure the temperature is lowered when the office is closed. We have installed insulated acoustical ceiling tiles to keep both heat and air conditioning from escaping.
• Click Off When Not In Use: Automatic turn-off light switches have been installed in both the office copy room and break room kitchenette. The lights automatically turn on when movement is detected, and after one minute of no activity, the lights are shut off.
• Next on the agenda is the installation of the same automatic motion detection switches in all offices and restrooms. Meanwhile, we encourage all employees to turn off their lights if they are going to leave their offices for any extended time periods and unplug their device chargers when they are fully charged. Whenever a current light bulb expires inside or outside of the building, it is replaced with a compact florescent energy saving light bulb.
• Energy Efficient Break Room: The employee break room kitchenette has been updated to include an Energy Star appliance. Putting brewed coffee into thermos carafes to keep coffee hot rather than keeping coffee pots turned on is energy saving. Using our newly installed ice maker to replace the previously purchased ice for company functions will save –there will be no more plastic bags, transportation and housing of the ice to get it to us as the consumer.
• Cut Back on Waste in the Kitchen: Eliminate the use of bottled water through the installation of a water cooler/instant heater, making non-bottled water available to all employees. We are investigating the acquisition of personalized hot beverage mugs and insulated water bottles to replace paper, plastic and Styrofoam cups formerly provided by Digital Pix.
• We have purchased stainless steel flatware to replace plastic ware formerly used for lunches and company functions. We are asking employees to bring in their own Corelle or other unbreakable plates to use in lieu of paper plates for lunches and company functions. We haven’t a solution for the replacement of paper napkins, but will continue to seek a solution.

Recycle-Recycle-Recycle

Recycling can be defined as the act of processing (as liquid body waste, glass, or cans) in order to regain material for human use. We use it in the sense of gathering materials that are not consumed in our production process (or homes) and donating the waste to a company that can actually covert the recycling into reusable materials.

Simply stated, our goal is to minimize or eliminate waste that needs to be recycled. To reach this goal, almost all of our waste is gathered and given to a recycler. There is a recycling bin located in every office. Employee use of these bins has resulted in a shift in the ratio between recycled materials and garbage – we now recycle far more than we discard.

Digital Pix has ended its outdated business model of selling packages on speculation since photo paper cannot be recycled. The reduction of paper waste in landfills is huge. Digital photography has eliminated film, the chemistry previously used in the development of analog film, and the discharge of wash water contaminated by chemicals introduced into wash water. The introduction of on-site digital pose selection has significantly reduced photo paper waste as there are no longer portrait proofs printed, mailed to customers, mailed back to Digital Pix and later discarded.

The waste that is produced now by digital portrait printers is minimal and handled safely, first by using initial on-site silver recovery from the chemistry, and second, by the condensation and removal of the discharge to a licensed handling company.

Implement Production Policies that Prevent Waste

• Click Off Whenever Possible: Certain employee policies have been put in place to fit the “Green” standard. When employees are out of their work areas, they are encouraged to turn off any lights near their desks and their computer monitors. This reduces more than 150 watts of energy. Employees are also encouraged to switch their computers to stand-by mode when not in use to save on energy. All outgoing emails have a new addition to the end of the signatures: ??Go green, please consider not printing this email. Don’t print it unless you have a good reason for keeping a paper copy! Charge your iPods, cell phones and PDAs in your car where the energy needed for the charge is free.
• Slow Down and Be Careful: All of our employees take special care to do everything correctly the first time to eliminate errors – product replacement to correct errors is extremely expensive and burdensome to the environment. By using the processes in place, our employees maintain quality and accuracy and take pride in their output. Digital Pix knows the care taken in our work makes a huge difference in the result of a composite.
• Eliminate Snail Mail: Use email wherever possible. Snail mail costs money and results in waste at the consumer end. Work with Digital Pix to virtually eliminate snail mail from every facet of our customer communication.

What Else Can We Do?

Our challenge is to constantly seek the next level of protection we can give to our environment. This question should always remain open-ended. Keep looking - there is always room for expansion and improvement in our “Green” effort. Help us to create policies that will move us closer to being a more Earth-Friendly company. The standards that Digital Pix has set for its product quality and customer service must carry through to its environmental procedures. Digital Pix invites everyone to join the Green movement, not just here, but everywhere!

Go Green Goals:

• Generate more recycling than garbage
• Actively seek to eliminate Raised Plaques composites
• Recycle all scrap
• Use emails, not snail mail
• Do not print – use Go Green emails
• Eliminate paper files – scan and create paperless files
• Plant more trees/shrubs
• Increase recycled paper for office use
• Use it or turn it off – lights, monitors, chargers
• Do work correctly the first time – eliminate waste
• Keep an eye out for more ways to create savings

Green Activities Implemented:

• Replaced bottle water with filtered water
• Replaced all appliances with Energy Star Appliances
• Used good insulation and insulated ceiling tiles throughout the building
• Replaced switches with automatic turn off lights
• Eliminated order speculation
• Installed and use programmable thermostats
• Recycled silver through the silver recovery process
• Replaced all incandescent bulbs with Compact Florescent Light bulbs
• Turning off Office equipment and lights while on break
• Charging iPods, cell phones and PDAs in the car
• No film used, completely digital
• Using stainless steel flatware, personal mugs and water bottles – eliminate plastic ware