YPC - The Greater Des Moines Partnership's Young Professionals Connection - News
YPC "Green" Award Winners
YPC Green Award Winners
Presented in partnership with Metro Waste Authority on Earth Day, April 22, 2010
“Greenest YPC Member” Award Winner – Adam Hammes
Adam Hammes has worked hard, both personally and professionally, to help contribute to making Greater Des Moines an even more sustainable community. In fact, he even sold his car in the fall of 2009 and now uses alternate forms of commute each and every day (he also logs these on www.DriveTimeDesMoines.org).
Adam volunteers more than 20 hours per week as Founder and Director of the sustainability non-profit “Urban Ambassadors,” where he consults about sustainability projects throughout the Greater Des Moines metro. In addition, Adam has designed a Transforming Business Speaker Series in Des Moines with four of the top sustainable business leaders in the United States, video blogged on Juice.com while cycling for three weeks and 750 miles down the coast of California, teaching sustainability in schools, and has designed 16 educational panels on sustainability, health, and wellness for the Natural Living Expo. He eats and grows local food choices by being a member of the privately-owned communal garden in the Drake Neighborhood called Lone Tree Gardens. At home, he has updated his residence with all low-flow water fixtures and compact fluorescent light bulbs, re-insulated the basement and heating & cooling air ducts, and has added shrink plastic window sealant in the winter.
Adam loves to read books about the subject, including “Go Green, Live Rich” by David Bach, and has also calculated his ecological footprint baseline at www.myfootprint.org.
“YPC’s Greenest Business” Award Winner – CDS Global
Since 2007, CDS Global, a technology-driven company that provides customer information and data management solutions, has taken a serious look at how the organization can become more eco-friendly. Since then, a number of initiatives have been put into place to help the company alleviate its carbon footprint. A Green Team was formed in Des Moines to implement and execute a number of eco-friendly initiatives throughout CDS Global. This team is supported by a number of green teams formed at our facilities across the U.S. and around the globe. Stations are set up throughout the organization to recycle paper, cardboard, nonredeemable plastic bottles, batteries and ink cartridges. “Power off” signs are posted throughout the conference rooms, collaboration areas and break rooms to reduce our company’s energy waste. CDS Global’s internal Web site, myCDSGlobal, launched a Web page dedicated to eco-friendly news articles and the latest company initiatives.
In the summer of 2009, a swap meet was organized for CDS Global employees to bring in and exchange items they no longer needed and/or used around their homes in an attempt to keep them out of the landfills.
For the past three years, CDS Global has celebrated Earth Day with a number of activities for employees to get involved with to understand the importance of becoming a more eco-friendly organization. These activities have included:
- A shredder truck on site for employees to bring personal or miscellaneous papers from home to be securely shredded and recycled at no cost
- Demonstrations of eco-friendly cleaning supplies and natural cleaning solution recipes
- Planting a tree at our facility that is dedicated by Malcolm Netburn, chairman and CEO of CDS Global
- Plastic grocery bag recycling for employees
Employees have the opportunity to participate in the company’s DART reimbursement program, which covers monthly bus passes and tokens. With the reimbursement program, employees save $15 on monthly bus passes in the Des Moines area, $22 on monthly passes in Ankeny and $4 on a pack of 10 tokens. CDS Global has also piggybacked off Drive Time Des Moines’ Rest Your Car program to encourage employees to car pool, van pool, ride the bus, bike or walk to work a few times a month, including prizes and incentives for those who participate.
CDS Global has several employees who car pool to and from work each day and understand the benefits of these commuter programs. To encourage employees to take advantage of these programs, a lunch and learn was organized for employees who live within certain ZIP codes around the metro area, giving them a chance to meet other individuals who live in the same area and are interested in car pool and van pool opportunities.