Our Contributions
Briggs & Stratton's legacy of corporate social responsibility and community involvement is reflected in its longstanding commitment to environmental stewardship.
As a successful company, Briggs & Stratton embraces two principles: maximizing benefit and being responsive and accountable to all stakeholders. In the environmental arena this has meant a continuous drive to improve operating efficiency, integrating environmentally friendly technology and renewable resources into its products, and reducing the company's environmental footprint globally.
“Healthy lawns can act as carbon sinks, draining carbon dioxide and other toxins from the atmosphere”
Did you know that healthy lawns can act as carbon sinks, draining carbon dioxide and other toxins from the atmosphere? A healthy lawn can also cool surrounding temperatures, reduce particulate matter, like dust and dirt, act as a sound buffer and increase property values. As the world's largest producer of engines for the outdoor power equipment industry as well as a multitude of consumer products for homeowners, the company recognizes its very important role in maintaining green space.
Powered by research and relentless innovation, Briggs & Stratton has dramatically cut the environmental impacts of its manufacturing processes while also improving the performance of its products. Consider this: Briggs & Stratton was one of the first companies in the United States to treat and recycle wastewater from plating operations.
- The Company also began working with suppliers to develop paints with significantly lower levels of volatile organic compounds and no heavy metals in the paint pigments, long before regulations required this. Emissions from the company's engine painting process have been reduced by more than 85 percent since 1990.
- The Company has eliminated cyanide and the heavy metals chromium and nickel in its piston plating operations, replacing the metals with iron. These changes created a superior piston, as well as one that was environmentally friendly.
- The Company reduced the number of underground storage tanks to 15 worldwide from a high of 72, helping protect aquifers that supply drinking water.
- Briggs & Stratton currently recycles 100 percent of its aluminum scrap, and all of the cast iron and steel components used in its products come from recycled materials.
- Saved 5.4 million kilowatt hours of electricity in facility lighting retrofits by Briggs & Stratton's Energy Conservation Teams. In comparison, 556 average homes in the U.S. generate the same amount of CO2 emissions in electricity alone!¹
- Annually, the company recycles approximately 35,000 lbs of computer and electronic devices.
These are only a few of the many actions that demonstrate the company's commitment to environmental stewardship. An engaged workforce, committed leadership and dedicated internal resources have made such advances possible. These same factors have helped the company reduce the emissions produced by its engines by almost 75 percent since 1995. And in the next five years Briggs & Stratton engines will be at least 35 percent cleaner. From the world's largest producer of small four-cycle engines, that's no small commitment. However, it is just one indication of Briggs & Stratton's dedication to building on and expanding its environmental achievements for another 100 years.
¹ US EPA Clean Energy Green House Gas Equivalency Calculator