It bans ozone-depleting substances from its products.
Imagine your boss asking you to learn more about how to preserve the planet—and then paying you to do so. Well, that's the case at Johnson & Johnson, where each company division must launch a five-year environmental literacy plan for its employees, with the introduction of at least one new educational program each year.
As one of the world's largest health-care companies, J&J knows that safeguarding the environment is both a moral and a business imperative. A major supporter of environmental organizations, including the World Wildlife Fund and the Nature Conservancy, it runs 70 of its own conservation projects and subjects all of its products to ecological risk assessments. Occasionally, doing due diligence means cleaning up old messes, as the company did in December when it agreed to remove hazardous waste from two Sayreville, NJ, sites it uses.
What J&J learns from such experiences clearly helps to inform its environmental management at home: Its scientists pursue green chemistry methods (allowing them to double drug output and halve waste); ozone-depleting substances have been banned from all products; and polyvinyl chloride (PVC), which creates toxins in processing, is being phased out of consumer items.
J&J has won a Green Power Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) a record five times. All of its U.S. locations meet strict environmental standards, and 40% of their power comes from renewable energy sources. Especially notable is J&J's La Jolla, CA, laboratory, which is entirely cooled, heated and powered by natural gas, further saving energy and lowering its carbon dioxide output.
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