ACE Sustainable Procurement Policy

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American Water Works Association (AWWA) is an international, nonprofit, scientific and educational organization dedicated to public health and assuring the effective management of water. AWWA’s Annual Conference and Exposition (ACE) is the world’s premier water conference – where the water community comes together to learn, connect, and be inspired to solve global water challenges. We are committed to improving ACE economic, environmental, and social impacts and enhancing conference elements that align with Water 2050 goals. This can only be achieved with the thoughtful support of the ACE staff and our partners.

This statement is meant to affirm our commitment to sourcing products and services from suppliers that further the Association’s sustainability and community stewardship goals as represented in our AWWA Strategic plan. It also intends to provide guidance to staff and partners regarding our procurement expectations.

Environmentally Committed Material Planning

As part of ACE’s commitment to a waste-free future, AWWA will consider all ACE materials produced, noting which materials are essential, and then working to ensure that items produced for the event have a suitable origin and/or end-of-life plan prior to production.

Priority planning for waste streams are as follows:

  • Evaluate and reduce unnecessary event purchases
  • Donate, save for re-use, or up-cycle
  • Divert to compost or recycling streams

Environmentally Committed Material Sourcing

Identifying sustainable and ethically sourced materials is essential for AWWA to demonstrate its commitment at ACE. This reduces our environmental impact and positions us as industry leaders in sustainable sourcing practices.

Our Guidelines for sourcing ACE items for minimal environmental impact:

  • Maximize scenic rentals over one time use purchases and builds
  • Avoid cut florals where possible and use plant rental options
  • Avoid foam core and vinyl substrates
  • Prefer products that come without packaging or in minimal, reusable, or recyclable packaging

Environmentally preferable products are defined as including one of these criteria:

  • Contain at least 10% post-consumer and/or 20% post-industrial recycled material
  • Contain at least 50% renewable materials
  • At least 50% of paper product purchases should be labeled Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified
  • Can be recycled or composted easily in the local waste streams

Suppliers from Local and Underrepresented Populations

Within this statement, “suppliers” refers to any third party that provides goods or services to ACE for compensation from AWWA.

AWWA’s commitment to inclusivity and diversity should reflect in the suppliers and service providers that earn our conference business. At ACE, we pledge to engage three businesses that are either registered as small (as defined by SBA size standards), local (within a 250-mile radius of event) or managed by historically underrepresented communities, supporting our 2030 Strategic Plan core principles.

Continuous Improvement

Sustainability and impact measurements are an ongoing process. We will evaluate this policy annually and adopt new business practices for enhancement.

ACE25 Commitments

  • We aim to divert a minimum of 30% of all show materials from the landfill. We also ask exhibitors to join us in these commitments by completing our 2025 Exhibitor Sustainability Pledge.
  • We commit 100% paper products purchased for ACE25 will meet these standards; additionally, the conference bag will be 100% post-consumer material.

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