Monday, January 25, 2010

USPS and sustainability

The Postal Service issued it's first Sustainability Report, describing what impact we are having on the world around us. The report, entitled "Delivering a Greener Tomorrow," outlines three sustainability goals: reducing greenhouse gas emissions, reducing waste to landfills and engaging USPS employees in sustainability programs and processes

A few highlights are:

  • A 9% decrease in overall energy consumption between 2005 and 2008 and decreasing facility energy use 18% over the same time period.
  • Recycled 232,000 tons of plastic and paper in 2008
  • Diverted 20,000 tons of paper waste from landfills through 4,000 Post Office recycling bins is office lobbies.
  • Reduced energy intensity by 17% since 2003 and increased alternative fuel use by 61% since 2005
  • Investing $150 million annually in facilities upgrades
  • Purchased more than $200 million in recycled products
What do you think about our green efforts? Enough? Need more? Comment here

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

What about the "new" way we have to label our outgoing mail! We use reems & reems of paper!!!!! What a colossal waste! No, I don't think the U.S.P.S. is serious about being green, except when they can put something in the news that makes it look good.

Anonymous said...

In May 2008, USPS appoints a "VP of Sustainability" at a salary of $175,000... and 1 1/2 years later, the first report is issued???

Anonymous said...

I agree with the first comment. MTEL is using too much paper. And having to run the CPMS report not once but TWICE and print both pages. Wasteful. Meanwhile, I keep the heat down and turn off the lights to try and conserve.

hailstone said...

Many of our faculities are older buildings with inadequate insulation, poorly designed entry points from energy viewpoint, poor lighting and very poor windows. Unfortunately many are rental buildings that we should be pressuring the landlords to upgrade these areas. Small town communities sometimes have other more favorable buildings for rent but changes are not made. Energy costs are only going to escalate in the coming years. I know because my house which was originally built in 1894 has been undergoing updates. My heating cost today is less than 20% of total fuel used in 1985. That's knocking a 3500 gallon propane usage down to less than 700 gallons per heating year in South Dakota. That was done with about $1500 investment in insulation and many man hours of my own labor in addition to new thermal pain windows.

Anonymous said...

I agree that we need to do more about the amount of paper that is wasted on printed reports, tub & tray labels. We should be able to save the reports in a file on the computer & only print them when asked for them, but some POOMS/Managers won't allow that. Facing slips and labels that each office now has to print should be made on recycled plastic or stiff paper and returned to offices to use again, like the placards used to separate PARS RTS mail. I do think it's good that HQ is beginning to think about sustainability - wouldn't it be great if every company in the world made efforts? Think of how much pollution, landfill waste, etc could be reduced and how many natural resources could be saved. Let's hope our efforts aren't too little too late.

Anonymous said...

I think there are a lot more conservation that could be done. What about all the reports I have to run on a daily basis, just to prove that I did my job, that are then filed away and never looked at again until it's time to shred them? All the placards I have to put on my outgoing mail? Too much wasted paper.

grannybunny said...

All of the comments are good, and the commenters should continue their efforts to eliminate such wasteful practices. However, when all is said and done, USPS is a leader in sustainability, and I am very proud of our efforts.

Anonymous said...

The Postal Service isn't doing enough to recycle, and conserve energy. I agree with the other comments that MTEL is a complete waste of paper. Each day, our office sends out collection mail that must first be separated, then labeled. Can one not look into the tub and see that this is a tub of flats? Can one not look and see that these are machineable parcels? Whenever we receive empty equipment, the bottoms are lined with used placards that have been torn off and disposed of in the empty equipment. Another waste is the POS report that is printed every night. I only need four pages out of the 10 that print. The rest goes to the trash. So if the Postal Service really wants to "go green", they need to dig a little deeper.

Anonymous said...

Yes, there needs to be something done. I recieved an e-mail telling me to distroy "ALL" my "old" placards and replace them with "NEW" ones. The The only difference is the date. Now all the placards are dated Jan 2010. But they said only to print one weeks worth at a time. I guess that means they might change again soon.

Anonymous said...

And we don't recycle in our office and leave lights on carrier cases all night long because supervisors are too darn lazy to go around and turn them off. We waste ALOT of paper at the window for receipts if we do a non-cash transaction and hit end of sale we get a receipt if a customer doesn't need a receipt we still print one out. OH I FORGOT WE HAVE TO OFFER ONE TO THE MYSTERY SHOPPER. The printers automatically print out 2 1412's what a waste of paper. Are we saving on paper I don't think so.

Anonymous said...

The idea of recyclying is a good one. I question the method used to gather the report. You have several high level Headquarter personnel basically doing data entry, when the facilities that are being monitored should be responsible for tracking their energy consumption. Our ERRP suggested recycling plastic bottles in our facility, but was told their was no money be buy containers to collect them.

Anonymous said...

Question about the comment above that says they "leave lights on carrier cases all night long because supervisors are too darn lazy to go around and turn them off." Why aren't the carriers turning them off when they leave? That's what we always do in my office and if someone later needs to turn one on while working at the case, they turn it on for those few minutes necessary then turn it off again when done.

Anonymous said...

I think in "principal" that the USPS is committed to going green, but in reality they are not open to suggestions. If you build a "green" roof at a cost of $1 million dollars...that saves $5000 a year in energy costs...it will take 200 years to recoup that expense! Yet we brag it up! We purchase computers for every office, to reduce paper files and the reality is that we print more reports then we did before the computers. We renovate/upgrade small rural offices to meet handicap accessible laws...but tell me...when was the last time you saw a wheel chair bound PM (level 13 and below), rural carrier, or clerk? Those renovations should take place when required. We have so many vacant positions that go unfilled do to excessing. Yet we pay the part timer to work 6 days and pay huge OT dollars. Vacant PM positions and we are paying OIC's milage daily...that go unfilled for over a year. The list goes on and on. I am totally conviced that the postal service will spend dollars to save dimes, and then call it progress!

Anonymous said...

1. Over 200K tons of paper reports to justify PFP but yet have absolutely no effect on critical processes other than management threatening & harassing employees, but no# does not reflect the amount of mail that is dumped into compactors consistently Nation Wide after being directed to do so by management, As for the 20K tons from the lobbies, this was by the motivation of the general public to actually use the recycling bins provided and nothing else.

2. Energy intensity or what ever they wish to label it has no choice but to be effected by the change of time. As our HVAC equipment and other facility necessities have aged and require replacement, they can only be replaced by what is now much more efficient items that what was initially installed. But lets look at what has been spent in the name of what some think is going green and trying to justify yet another PFP no#. Lighting fixtures and bulb replacements-Need I say more on that, electric vehicles? OMG, during the hardest times the real world faced during this so called recession and management jumping on the band wagon placing blame there also, new vehicles were purchased to replace all of the current ones at our facility-WHY? All in the name of going green? I thought we were in the negative on the budget but yet the spending and rewarding management continues in an already GROSSLY over populated management structure. WTG and keep on thinking up more ways to waste monies because the only one you are fooling is yourself. So as the NEW tracking game continues on which area can reduce man hours by eliminating craft employees and closing needed facilities instead of all the wasted monies being spent on those useless "Area & District Offices and Jobs" this to in turn will greatly reduce spending contributing to a drop in energy and contributing to PFP no#s. WTG again!!! Keep on REWARDING your selfs until we are forced to close the doors on the USPS.