Greening Austin Daily

Spotlight on Local Businesses: National Instruments Part 2

10th March, 2010 - Posted by katherine - No Comments

Today we have part 2 of our spotlight on National Instruments (NI) as a local business improving the environment.  In the future we hope to learn more about all sorts of businesses in Austin, and would like to feature one business a month.

Part 1 of our spotlight focused just on the new CFL bulbs NI installed in 2 of their garages.  Part 2 is comprised of some interesting measures NI has taken in the past few years dealing with recycling, energy & water use, and landscaping.  Below are just a few of the steps the company has taken – I cut some out because reading all of the measures they have taken is a little overwhelming,  so I have included what I consider the high points.

Recycling & Waste

General:

• In 2008 the company placed recycling containers in all conference rooms, break rooms, garages, decks and common areas throughout campus.
• The company also replaced all Styrofoam in the cafeterias with washable dishes, cups and utensils.
• In 2006 the company put an electronic recycling program in practice.

Batteries:

• NI has been recycling batteries alkaline and large acid batteries since April 2005.

Energy & Water Use (remember, the average American house uses about 10,000 Kwh/year)

• In 2009 the company replaced florescent bulbs in its garages to CFLS, as discussed before.
• NI also adjusted all the stop/start times for floor and area air conditioning to minimize run times in all buildings.
• The company added motion sensors to all large break rooms and medium size conference rooms in 2 of its’ buildings, saving 3,450 Kwh/yr.
• The company also added timers to 41 coffee makers, minimizing needless operation of heater elements, saving 20,828 Kwh/yr. (Dang! that’s enough to power about 2 houses!)
• In all buildings the company removed dimmable 100 watt incandescent in large sized conference rooms and replaced them with 23 watt compact fluorescent bulbs, saving about 8,950 Kwh/yr.
• In 2008 the company replaced all of the old style 3 bulb – 32 watt florescent bulbs to 25 watt bulbs in one building, reducing consumption by 183,456 Kwh/yr.
• The company also  retrofitted the lighting in its Austin lobby, reducing consumption by 19,272 Kwh/yr.
• In 2008, NI also added variable speed drives to the outside air and toilet exhaust fans in one building – not sure what that means exactly (!) but it reduced energy consumption by 124,000 Kwh/yr.
• The company also added motion sensors to all restrooms, saving 36,192 Kwh/yr.
• In 2007 NI removed conventional garbage disposal units and replaced them with drain screens to catch solids to be removed manually. This measure, along with replacing restroom faucets and kitchen sprayers, saved approximately 1,500,000 gallons of water per year.
• In 2007 the company also replaced the water-cooled condenser for the kitchen ice maker with an air-cooled unit, saving an estimated 2 million gallons of water/year.

Landscaping

• In Spring of 2009, Lantana and Mexican Heather replaced the majority of flowers that were being changed out quarterly. These flowering plants are more suited to droughts, and the Texas sun, while requiring less water.