Going Green: Creating Eco-Friendly Warehouses

Warehouses have the potential to be eco-friendly environments. Environmentally friendly efforts in warehouses can help both your business goals and the plant. You can reduce your utility bills, minimize your carbon footprint and boost your reputation, all while helping the planet.

How to Go Green in the Warehouse

There are many ways to implement green initiatives in your warehouse. Even if you’re not up for a complete redesign of your facility, there are plenty of small steps you can take that cause big change. And remember, it doesn’t all have to happen at once. You can work your way toward your warehouse going green over several years.

Here are some of the ways you can start going green:

• Reduce. Let’s start with the first of our three “R’s.” Reducing is all about minimizing your material use. Consider things like cutting back on packaging or merging shipments together and switching to paperless invoices.
• Reuse. Of the materials you do need, make sure you get as much use out of them as possible. Use metal or plastic pallets and containers instead of their disposable counterparts. You can even reuse supplier materials and ask your customers to send back their packaging for you to reuse.
• Recycle. Some warehouses create significant amounts of recyclable waste. If you aren’t already recycling, you should be. Look into warehouse recycling solutions to minimize your contribution to landfills.
• Consider new lights. Lighting is one of the largest uses of electricity in commercial buildings in the United States, so efficient lights can make a big difference if you want to reduce your carbon footprint. Many warehouse facilities are still using fluorescent lights or high-intensity discharge lights, neither of which can match the performance of light-emitting diode (LED) lights. LEDs are much more efficient and brighter, which also contributes to the safety of the facility. Other things to consider include solar energy, motion-activated lights and natural daylighting.
• Switch to energy-efficient equipment. As your equipment ages and must be replaced, look for more energy-efficient options to reduce energy consumption. Encourage energy-saving mindsets in employees, too, such as turning off equipment after use.
• Audit your heating and cooling. Poor insulation or outdated heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems can create unnecessary energy loss along with an uncomfortable building.
• Switch to electric forklifts. Electric forklifts typically cost less to operate, eliminate the use of fossil fuels and create fewer emissions that could be damaging to worker health. They’re an excellent alternative to liquified-petroleum gas or propane-powered forklifts.

How Finale Inventory Goes Green

The right warehouse inventory management system can help you on your journey to a green warehouse. Finale Inventory can help you reduce your paper usage, efficiently manage your inventory and keep things running smoothly. Understanding your inventory with real-time tracking and powerful analytics means you can optimize your system for reduced packaging, lower energy consumption and a variety of other goals. Plus, you may find savings that allow you to spend more on green initiatives and help your business do its part in saving the planet.