Improving Access to Water

Access to Water

In 2007, Abbott manufacturing consumed approximately 13.7 billion gallons of water. This is a 9 percent reduction over 2006, due in large part to significant process changes implemented at our Puerto Rico manufacturing site. Our comprehensive water strategy focuses on three key areas:

• improving our operations and product design,
• assessing and mitigating risks to our business due to regional water stress, and
• facilitating access to high-quality water in global communities.

Position statement on access to water

We implemented new information technology to enable the evaluation of water-related risks at our manufacturing sites and to plan our water-management strategy accordingly. Moving forward, we will collaborate with our businesses and stakeholders to identify water conservation projects, especially in water-stressed regions where we have manufacturing operations.

Reducing Water Use

We have implemented a number of innovative water reduction/conservation projects worldwide that are projected to save 180 million gallons of water per year.

• Replaced standard water scrubbers at our nutrition plant in Sturgis, Michigan, with high-efficiency scrubbers that use nearly 75% less water. We also automated the system to shut down the scrubbers during low-demand periods. These improvements are expected to conserve about 8.5 million gallons of water annually.
• Reduced the water used during equipment and manufacturing rinse cycles at many plants. One of our North Chicago sites reduced its water flow rate associated with process-related vacuum pumps by 50 percent, saving 27 million gallons of water per year.
• Optimized reverse osmosis (RO) systems at many sites to recover and recycle the RO reject water stream. In addition, the systems automatically shut down during low-demand periods.
• Replaced the water scrubbers at the plant in Campoverde, Italy, with glycol scrubbers, which is expected to reduce water use by 14 million gallons per year.

These and other water conservation projects were enabled through a dedicated global fund for investment in environmental projects that do not meet traditional rates of return on investment.

In 2008, we plan to:

• Recycle and reuse treated wastewater in China, Brazil and Mexico. The plans are in compliance with applicable regulatory requirements and are expected to achieve water savings of 9 million gallons per year.
• Harvest rainwater in Ireland for use in lavatory facilities, which is expected to reduce water usage for this purpose by approximately 60 percent.
• Retrofit existing equipment at a number of sites to reduce water usage, including installation of low-flow toilets and faucets.