Lockheed Martin's campaign to embed sustainability into its operations has driven down the company's energy costs for IT by $2.6 million a year and enabled the firm to exceed targets for reducing water consumption and the amount of waste sent to landfill, according to the company's latest data on environmental progress.

Best known for its contracts with the U.S. Department of Defense and other federal agencies, Lockheed Martin is a global security company specializing in advanced technology systems, products and services.

The firm is not as widely known for its sustainability efforts, but the company is gaining ground in changing that: Earlier this month, Greentech Media named the firm one of the Top Ten Green Giants for 2011, and last week Lockheed Martin issued its latest Corporate Energy, Environment, Safety and Health Report, which showed strong progress in several areas.

Three years ago, the company set goals of reducing water use, the amount of waste sent to landfill and greenhouse gas emissions by 25 percent by the close of 2012, based on 2007 levels.

The targets are absolute reductions rather than reductions in intensity, in which consumption, waste and emission typically are measured in comparison to other factors such revenue, units of production or the number of employees. Achieving an absolute reduction is considered a greater challenge; a reduction in intensity can indicate greater efficiency, but it does not necessarily mean that total use, waste or emissions have decreased.

"I think that Lockheed Martin has always been driven by a sense of doing the right thing," said David Constable, the company's vice president for energy, environment, safety and health. And having decided that pursuing a certain course is the right thing to do, "you just do it," Constable said of the firm's commitment to absolute reductions. "It's the right thing to do for the environment and for the company."

Lockheed Martin's new energy, environment, safety and health report, which is available online, shows that by the end of 2010 the company had:

• Cut water use by 22 percent as a result of efficiency and conservation measures.
• Decreased the amount of waste sent to landfill by 26 percent, exceeding the targeted reduction.
• Cut carbon emissions by 15 percent as a result of energy efficiency efforts and purchase of wind and solar energy and renewable energy credits.

By the end of the first quarter of this year, the firm had surpassed two goals by bringing the reduction in water consumption to 27 percent and the cut in waste-to-landfill to 30 percent, Constable said.

Progress charted in the report includes Lockheed Martin's work to green IT, which is central to the firm's business. The company has consolidated 4,000 data servers in the past three years, a move that has led to a savings of 26 million kWh of electricity and $2.6 million in annual costs.