Nestle Pennsylvania Facility Receives LEED Gold Certification

Nestle Waters North America's Nestle Pure Lifewater bottling facility in Breinigsville, Penn., has received the U.S. Green Building Council's Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design Gold certification. This is the first food manufacturing facility in Pennsylvania to receive LEED Gold status.

LEED is an internationally recognized certification system that measures how well a building performs across various sustainability metrics, including energy savings, water efficiency, CO2 emissions reduction, and stewardship of resources.

In 2003, Nestle received its first LEED certification in the U.S. for a food and beverage factory for its Stanwood, Mich., plant. To date, Nestle Waters has the most LEED-certified facilities of any U.S. food and beverage manufacturer, with more than 2.5 million square feet designed and built to meet LEED certification.

"We are honored to achieve the LEED Gold standard - our first and hopefully not our last," said Kim Jeffery, president and CEO of Nestle Waters North America, which has committed to building all new plants to LEED certification standards. "We are committed to being thoughtful and responsible in every aspect of our business, from source to bottle. We have more to do, and we are excited to continue our journey toward more sustainable operations."

Steps the Pennsylvania facility was recognized for are:

Saving 9.9 billion BTU's of energy each year;

Conserving about 220,000 gallons of water a year, 55 percent better than EPA requirements

Reduced construction waste by about 75 percent

In addition, the Nestle Pure Life facility will offset its energy usage for two years through its Renewable Energy Certificate purchase from Choose Renewables, which will allow the facility to displace its non-renewable sources of energy from the electric grid and instead fund wind power operations.

Three additional Nestle Waters North America plants are currently under review for LEED status.