Programs

In advancing our mission to promote Ecofficiency, it is vital for us to actively facilitate this process — not just talk about it. One of the ways we do this is through our Ecofficiency Certification Plans, which we have developed as a means to help small businesses adopt ecofficient practices.

Our Ecofficiency Certification Plans are implemented through local Ecofficiency.org chapters and student groups within a particular community. Of course, anyone interested in volunteering for us in this process is more than welcome, and individual businesses and organizations can certainly come to us on their own. All of our plans include proprietary language, research, and monitoring, and can ONLY be implemented with our guidance — which, in turn, comes with an ecofficiency certification.

The student groups we work with (high school through college) are highly motivated, exceptionally competent, and are looking for real world work experience. Having student groups assist businesses in implementing our Ecofficiency Certification Plans, allows businesses to save an enormous amount of money in consultancy fees, while receiving a solid plan to work from that makes a real difference. We then promote the efforts of both the business and the student groups, and the students themselves receive valuable real world work experience in the emerging "green economy." This is the classic "win - win" situation

There are two main reasons that keep willing businesses from incorporating ecofficient practices:

  1. A lack of time to research available options

  2. The belief that it is an expensive process

How we implement our ecofficiency plans addresses both issues

  1. We have developed a set of standardized plans for specific industries (see below), which can be easily customized for individual businesses
  2. We train Ecofficiency.org chapters, student groups, and volunteers to help individual businesses customize and implement our plans, at minimal cost

In order to maximize our effect, we only focus on a few ecofficiency plans. However, we are always open to new ideas, and we will expand our services as we continue to grow. We have chosen to address these particular industries because of their high visibility within a community, and the structured nature of their practices, but also because the impact they have on our world is quite significant.

Overview of Ecofficiency Plans:  

Food Service
We establish and publicize three levels of an Ecofficiency.org Certification for food service businesses.

  • We have developed a point system to categorize restaurant's efforts to become more ecofficient
    • We rate restaurants on four different levels of ecofficient practices, based on the accumulated points
    • Each level comes with an increased amounts of recognition
  • All participating restaurants will be provided with certification materials acknowledging their ecofficiency rating, which can be posted in their restaurant in a manner of their choosing
  • All participating restaurants are encouraged to post additional educational materials about our program, which are made available at no additional cost.
  • All participating restaurants will be recognized on our website, and depending on the rating they achieve, provided with a profile and link to their restaurant's webpage
  • All participating restaurants must:
    • Comply with basic principals that promote ecofficient practices
    • Agree to be transparent in their efforts
    • Submit to annual review

Dry Cleaning

We establish and publicize an Ecofficiency.org Certification, accompanied with certification materials to be posted in a manner of participating dry cleaners' choosing, as well as web link and profile for their business on our website.

For certification, ALL dry cleaners must comply with ALL of the following:

  • Offer a "green" dry cleaning system
    • Liquid carbon dioxide surfactant systems
    • Professional "wet cleaning" systems
    • Silicone based solvent systems
    • Perc (perchloroethylene) based systems are NOT allowable for our certification under ANY circumstance
  • Actively reuse or recycle their customer's plastic bags and hangers
  • Eliminate the use of paper on their hangers
  • Offer and accept reusable dry-cleaning bags
  • Agree to be transparent in their efforts
  • Submit to annual review

Ecofficient Office Management
Each office must submit to annual review, and be transparent in their actions. There are two levels of compliance for Ecofficient Office Management Certification.

Level one (12 points needed):

  • Ecofficiency.org Certification materials will be provided, in addition to a link to participating company's website

Level two (18 points needed):

  • Ecofficiency.org Certification materials will be provided, as well as a profile on our website in addition to a link to a participating company's website.

Checklist:

  • Change to energy efficient light-bulbs (2 points)
  • Turn off all computers and printers at night (1 point)
  • Set default printer settings to print on both sides of paper (1 point)
  • Mandate black and white printing unless color is absolutely necessary (1 point)
  • Use only recycled ink cartridges (2 points)
  • Paper use:
    • Use only recycled paper (1 point)
    • Implement a recycling program (1 point)
    • Mandated use of paperless options whenever possible (1 point)
  • Provide filtered drinking water to reduce plastic water bottle use (1 point)
  • Provide only fair trade coffee (1 point)
  • Require employees to use their own coffee cups, plates, silverware, etc. (1 point)
    • Do NOT provide single use kitchen items
  • Organize carpool options for employees (1 point)
  • Encourage employees to minimize dry cleaning needs:
    • Adopt a casual dress day in addition to Fridays (1 point) -or-
    • Encourage business casual whenever appropriate (1 point)
    • Partner with an ecofficiency approved dry cleaner (1 point)
  • Facilities management:
    • Push for ecofficient landscaping maintenance in your building (2 points)
    • Use natural cleaning products (2 point)
    • HVAC efficiency (2 points)
  • Make Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) available in 401k plans (2 points)

Landscape Maintenance

Program implementation is currently under development, but will include the following action items:

  • Water only at night
    • Reduces water loss
    • Improves health of plant, and allows roots to grow deeper
  • Eliminate the use of leaf blowers
    • Leaf blowers use 2-stroke engines that emit massive amounts of carbon
    • Health risk from localized air pollution resulting from dust blown
    • Noise pollution issues
    • Using rakes and brooms does just as good of a job
  • Use natural herbicides and pesticides whenever possible
  • Use electric and battery powered maintenance equipment whenever possible
  • Replace non-native and/or water dependent plants with native plants that do not require as much water

For detailed information on any of our ecofficiency plans, please contact us at: hello@ecofficiency.org

Site Credits