The Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Columbus, has named the first six silver award recipients of its Encouraging Environmental Excellence (E3) program. E3 is designed to recognize organizations committed to what the agency calls “environmental excellence at all levels.”

The program provides different recognition levels: Bronze, Silver and Gold. Several of the initial silver award recipients were recognized for a recycling component of their environmental commitment, including:

•    GM Toledo – “Routine waste has been reduced by 80 percent” at this vehicle transmission production plant. In the most recent one-year period, 94 percent of waste or scrap was recycled and 6 percent was shipped to an energy recovery facility.
•    Marathon Petroleum Co.’s Findlay Office Complex – At this 13-acre corporate headquarters, what began as an office recycling program has expanded into a comprehensive recycling effort. The office has recycled 1 ton of batteries, 20 tons of food scraps, 3 tons of toner cartridges, 10 tons of scrap metal and 103 tons of mixed office recyclables, including paper, soda cans and bottles, cardboard and mixed plastics encompassing 50 percent of the office’s discards stream.
•    Honda - Marysville, East Liberty, Anna, and Russells Point – Honda Manufacturing has facilities in Marysville, East Liberty, Anna and Russells Point that produce motor vehicles, engines and drivetrain components. The company achieved “zero landfill waste” status in early 2011, which reduced material sent for landfill disposal by more than 2.8 million pounds in one year.
•    DRS Environmental Systems Inc. - Cincinnati - This designer and maker of trailers and shelters switched from 55-gallon drums to canisters, using up 100 percent of the material and sending empty canisters back for recycling, eliminating a former waste stream.

Also honored by the Ohio EPA were Wright Patterson Air Force Base near Dayton and a Frito-Lay facility in Wooster.