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Puget Sound
Clean Water Pledge
Committing to a Healthier Puget Sound
To restore the water ecosystem in Puget Sound we need to engage private land and private capital, in addition to public resources. The best actions of NGOs and government agencies are insufficient for the challenge at hand. Business leaders can contribute unique experiences, strategies, and leadership to make the difference.
Intentional actions led by the private sector, with participation from NGOs, government agencies like Puget Sound Partnership, and learning institutions like University of Washington and Washington State University, may be our best and only hope to ensure that Puget Sound continues to be healthy and habitable for both the human and wildlife species.
JOIN THE WATER 100 PROJECT
We are asking for your commitment to join the Water 100 Project. Company leaders, in a position of authority, can take this step by signing the Puget Sound Clean Water Pledge. The pledge aligns with the UN Global Compact’s CEO Water Mandate and Water Resilience Coalition, so it offers tangible milestones toward global water sustainability efforts in our own backyard.
Our commitment in return is to participate in mutually beneficial communication, publish case stories about your efforts, and provide access to scientific research and data that becomes available to The Nature Conservancy and Puget Sound Partnership through the Water 100 Project.
PUGET SOUND CLEAN WATER PLEDGE:
Contact us to learn more or take the next step to sign the pledge.
Puget Sound Clean Water Pledge
Water is one of humanity’s most vital natural resources. Beyond daily human consumption, virtually all businesses use water in their work processes. In Western Washington, many people will experience climate change impacts first through the water cycle in the form of flooding, water shortage, and water pollution. Increasingly, water risks pose some of the most critical sustainable development challenges of our time. Solving them is crucial to business management and the business community can lead the way toward a more water resilient future for all.
As we each endeavor to understand the water challenges for our businesses and the communities in which we operate, we embrace a strategy for businesses to engage positively to overcome those challenges.
Endorsers of the Puget Sound Clean Water Pledge commit to continuous progress toward stewardship and, in so doing, understand and manage their own water risks and commit to supporting the most impactful solutions for a clean Puget Sound.
The Puget Sound Clean Water Pledge creates a forum to share best and emerging practices, to collaborate across the Puget Sound region in proactively addressing challenges related to flooding, water supply, water quality, and to promote water security.
In Washington we pride ourselves as being front runners. This Puget Sound Clean Water Pledge was developed with the intent of helping our hometown companies showcase tangible actions toward the Water Resilience Pledge from the UN Global Compact’s CEO Water Mandate.
Endorsers of the pledge choose from one or more areas of engagement to address water security for our region. Whether it is monitoring and improving water use within an organization or applying resources to innovate new clean water solutions, the pledge provides a path for corporations to contribute to a more water resilient future.
NET POSITIVE WATER - manage your own water footprint toward a net positive water impact
Achieve a measurable and net positive impact in water-stressed basins on availability, quality, and accessibility through industry-leading water operations and basin initiatives.
Our company works toward continuous progress on water stewardship, and in doing so we understand and manage our water risks. We will document our water footprint in a transparent way and adaptively manage our corporate impact on the water cycle in the communities in which we operate and our downstream neighbors.
- Conduct and share a water balance exercise to understand our water impact related to water use, water resource management, water quality, flood risk, water supply and water security.
- Set performance-based targets for our operations related to water efficiency, wastewater treatment, treating runoff from impervious surfaces and increasing flood storage capacity through the use of nature-based solutions.
- Raise awareness of water sustainability within our corporate culture and externally to our consumers. Embrace water sustainability considerations in business decision making and report on progress toward meeting goals.
INVEST & ADVOCATE - support organizations doing great work, build a water resilient supply chain
Invest in and enable innovative water resilience practices. Our company invests corporate resources in water sustainability efforts that are designed to benefit both people and nature. We advocate for community-driven, high-impact watershed management approaches that benefit the ecosystem and people most impacted by water risk and health disparities.
- Invest in non-profit organizations that are working on high-impact actions that benefit water quality, water resource management, sustainable supply chains, and that make our communities more resilient.
- Invest in existing approaches to achieve watershed stewardship goals. Share learning so others may benefit. Encourage supply chains to adopt similar strategies.
- Advocate for nature-based solutions and water resilience actions in watersheds across Puget Sound.
WATER INNOVATOR – Demonstrate global leadership by using the power of our expertise to develop new, game-changing, performance-driven solutions
Raise the global ambition of water resilience through outreach and corporate innovation. Our company embraces the problem-solving nature of our industry and is seeking to channel that expertise toward water sustainability efforts. We have seen “disruption” change the world and all our lives in positive ways over the last decade and understand our skills can help solve problems for all communities. We will use our same assets to advance water resilience strategies — be they technology, engineering, innovation, customer engagement, vendor engagement, or influence.
- Apply company resources to innovate new game-changing technologies and approaches that increase the body of solutions and tools for sustainable water management.
- Advance water monitoring intelligence, use of big data, and performance-driven watershed management strategies in collaboration with governments, tribes, businesses, non-profits and other stakeholders.
- Deploy public affairs expertise toward normalizing new approaches in policy at all levels of government in collaboration with governments, tribes, businesses, non-profits and other stakeholders.