If you wonder what happens to those vials of blood drawn while in the doctor”™s office or from your hospital bed, wonder no more: They are sent to laboratories where blood is mixed with re-agents that can tell your physician how much oxygen, carbon dioxide and other gases are in your blood, how your white and red cell counts are doing and if your blood”™s chemical composition is normal or out of whack.
One of the country”™s leading distributors and manufacturers of this life-saving equipment is located in the Hudson Valley on eight acres in the Rockland County town of Orangeburg.
Instrumentation Laboratory is not just in the hemostatis and critical-care equipment and supply business; it is also concerned about being environmentally friendly.
While some businesses employ geo-thermal heating and cooling, create vegetated roofing or install their own wind turbine to generate power, the everyday measures Instrumentation Laboratory employs have not only saved the R&D facility several thousand dollars each year, but can be condensed to work just as effectively in a residential setting.
“The first step was to encourage recycling among our employees,” said John Lorenzo, a 10-year veteran of the global company and a mentor on the Rockland Business Association”™s Green Council, which meets monthly. With 100,000 square feet and 200 employees, IL was generating plenty of trash, but none of it separated into recyclable use. Lorenzo”™s first challenge was to re-educate the work force.
“Each work station has a bin for paper and cardboard and one for bottles and plastics,” says Lorenzo. “We also trained our cleaning crew to employ the same habits; rather than dumping all the trash into one large container, they have learned to separate out what is cardboard, glass and plastic and make sure it”™s disposed of accordingly. Since workstations having separate recyclable wastebaskets, it makes it that much easier for the cleaning crew to get the job done right.
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“It also saves a lot of money,” continued Lorenzo. “Ten years ago, we were using a 30-yard roll-off container every week to dispose of trash. Despite the company consolidating and building out this space to three times its original footprint in 1999, we are still using the same 30-yard roll-off, but using it every other week, rather than every week, due to our recycling efforts. It”™s just a matter of taking the initiative and getting used to it until it becomes second nature. Changing to fluorescent lighting and recycling has saved us thousands and can easily be applied to any household. We recycle old equipment and computers rather than throwing them in Dumpsters. We”™ve retrained ourselves to work differently, and the benefits are seen in cost savings and in keeping the environment cleaner.”
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Lorenzo and Randall Vlasak, facilities and projects manager, have implemented systems to keep the manufacturing facility”™s electricity needs running at top performance while keeping costs at a minimum.
“We store and ship blood re-agents here,” said Vlasak, “and these products must be kept at a certain temperature to remain fresh. We have other products that need to be kept at room temperature, so the building has varying needs. We”™ve done our homework and instituted ways to save on electricity, bringing down our costs by $50,000 a year; and we”™ve managed to maintain that $50,000 cost savings despite the expansion we went through. We are still saving money and maintaining the same quality control.”
Instrumentation Laboratory is part of the Werfern Group, which has offices and manufacturing sites in 25 countries employing 1,600 people; its U.S. headquarters is in Bedford, Mass. Orangeburg is one of its two manufacturing and R&D centers in the U.S. for critical care and hemostasis in-vitro diagnostic products. The Orangeburg facility ships more than 1.5 million units a month, ranging from 2 ml. ampules to 4 liter rinse bottles and critical care products.
“We are currently working on completing our certification for ISO (International Organization for Standardization) 1400 and are targeted to be fully complaint by the third quarter of this year,” said Vlasak. ISO1400”™s goal is to reduce the environmental footprint and decrease waste in the workplace. “Acquiring that certification is not a mandate. It is our company”™s goal to be as environmentally friendly as possible.”
Instrumentation Laboratory, celebrating its 50th anniversary, will be one of the companies honored at the Rockland Business Association”™s first Green Council Awards. The event will be held in the Palisades IBM Dolce Center on Thursday, Feb. 25 beginning at 6 p.m.
In addition to honoring Instrumentation Laboratory in the large business category, Decorating with Fabric (small business), Rockland BOCES (education), town of Orangetown Environmental Committee (government) and Camp Venture (not for profit) will share the green spotlight, provided by Orange and Rockland Utilities.
