'Green' Gains Steam

The eco-friendly movement hits the security world

• By Megan Weadock
• Jun 01, 2008

In 1999, it was Y2K. Chad won in 2000. Each year, members of the American Dialect Society choose the word of the year, a word that had enough impact to summarize the year as a whole. Last year, not surprisingly, it was subprime. My guess is that 2008’s word will be the one that is everywhere right now: green.

Consumers are jumping on the ecofriendly bandwagon like never before, and that demand is driving some exciting innovation in nearly every industry. In the security field, two well-known companies are ahead of the curve, providing their customers with products that fit in nicely with the growing green trend.

Earth-friendly ID
Brady People ID, headquartered in Burlington, Mass., provides access control products to a variety of industries. This year, the company introduced its Eco-Friendly Family of products, which includes lanyards, badge holders, strap clips and PVC cards that are manufactured using environmentally friendly techniques and materials.

“Our company alone produces more than 50 million strap clips per year,” said Janet Frenner, marketing communications manager for Brady People ID. “We also manufacture millions of badge holders and lanyards. Making these products available as biodegradable is a step in the right direction to help reduce products that sit in landfills forever. We need to help companies think green and make it easy for them to find Earth-friendly products.”

The company’s eco-friendly lanyards are made of bamboo fiber, which can degrade naturally and don’t cause environmental pollutants. The eco-friendly badge holders and strap clips, manufactured with recyclable ethylene-vinyl acetate material, are durable, environmentally friendly and RoHS compliant.

The new Eco-Friendly PVC card is a non-crude oil alternative. Made of corn, a renewable energy resource, the cards are compatible with commercial recycling programs but are virtually identical to Brady People ID’s traditional plastic cards.

A Growing Demand
As international attention continues to focus on environmental issues, the supply of green products—and the innovation customers are seeking—is catching up to demand.

“We developed these products because our customers asked for them,” Frenner said. “It was their feedback and recommendations that led to their creation. Businesses should take the lead and provide security products to visitors and employees that are Earth-friendly.”

One company that has embraced its role as a green leader has been ecofriendly for years. Sun Surveillance Inc., located in Spartanburg, S.C., was founded in 2004. The company set out to provide security integrators with a wireless solar-powered surveillance camera system for remote surveillance.

“The founders conceived an idea that would provide a solution to both homeland security and alternative energy, two of the fastest growing concerns nationally,” said Todd Wright, director of sales for Sun Surveillance.

The result was SolsticeCam, a solarpowered camera system that can be installed where digging and trenching are infeasible or too costly. The stand-alone camera system operates on solar power and transmits video data wirelessly to a convenient location where video can be monitored and recorded.

“We hadn’t envisioned all the seemingly endless uses SolsticeCam would provide,” Wright said. “Customers were inquiring about SolsticeCam providing wireless video monitoring for applications including agriculture, highways, construction sites, ranches, pipelines and even residential applications.”

The Earth-friendliness of the system, however, had been a major factor for the company’s founders all along.

“The impact has been considerable when you consider, for example, the preservation of protected geographical and wildlife areas,” Wright said. “SolsticeCam has allowed parks, wildlife sanctuaries and reserves to monitor these areas for trespassing, illegal waste dumping, vandalism and crowd control, which would been previously out of the question.”

In these cases, the wildlife authorities were unwilling or unable to dig and trench through protected areas, making SolsticeCam the perfect fit. Because they are solar powered, the systems do not contribute to CO2 emissions. They also further prevent CO2 emissions by eliminating the need to operate gas-powered machinery that is used for digging and trenching fiber-optic cable lines.

“When we launched SolsticeCam, terms such as ‘green’ and ‘eco-friendly’ or ‘environmentally friendly’ were commonplace,” Wright said. “One question at hand was how consumers’ ever-increasing focus on eco-friendly products would impact their decisions.”

An Eco-conscious Future
Today, it’s clear that many people’s ecoawareness is playing a significant role in their lifestyles. Both Sun Surveillance and Brady People ID plan to continue to make the most of this trend while helping the environment along the way.

“Although the security and wireless technology is continuously changing, providing solar power for these systems remains fundamental,” Wright said. “Sun Surveillance proactively researches the latest security technology that allows solar-powered solutions to be provided.”

In addition to solar-powered surveillance, Wright said the company also will provide wind-generated power systems along the coastal regions for an even more cost-effective solution.

As for Brady People ID, its Earthfriendliness is just getting started.

“Brady People ID has just begun to open the door to fill the need in this market,” Frenner said. “Taking this green initiative has only made us stronger by being able to broaden our product line.”