Empowering People, Transforming the Grid
Back to TopThere has never been a more important time to be in the electrical industry. The ongoing energy transition toward clean electricity and the impacts of climate change are driving investment in a resilient and reliable electrical grid. That grid starts with S&C and our team members, who are the heart of everything we do. Working together, our innovative technologies help customers solve some of our planet’s biggest challenges.
None of this is possible without our team members; their health and safety are our top priorities. To emphasize this importance, all meetings open with a “safety moment,” where we acknowledge potential risks and how to handle them. Additionally, we expanded nursing staff availability and launched a new multi-faceted ergonomics program to prevent musculoskeletal and soft tissue injuries. We also focused on employee-engagement activities to foster a safety culture throughout the year.
These activities highlight our safety mantra: “If you see something, say and do something.” We believe all safety incidents are preventable. And, as reported via our engagement survey, 90% of our team members believe S&C is committed to their safety.
We are proud of our diverse workforce and continue to focus on ensuring an inclusive and equitable working environment that reflects our core value of Respect for People. In 2023, we expanded healthcare benefits for domestic partners and instituted mandatory inclusion and implicit bias training for all company leaders. All Quarterly Leadership Meetings feature a DE&I moment to emphasize our continuing progress.
This year, we formalized our decarbonization goals with a commitment to achieve net zero emissions by 2050 and interim reduction targets by 2030. We are off to an excellent start in pursuing these ambitious targets. Our manufacturing processes have been 100 percent powered by renewable sources globally since 2020. And compared with our baseline year, 2014, we have reduced our greenhouse gas emissions by 78 percent.
Alongside these achievements, we continue to drive innovation in technology and product development. In 2023, we launched the first self-healing solution for residential underground distribution circuits, the EdgeRestore® Underground Distribution Restoration System. Developed in close collaboration with one of our customers, this industry-leading solution identifies faults in single-phase underground residential circuits. It then reroutes electricity from an alternate source within 60 seconds, reducing extended power outages for residential consumers and advancing grid resilience.
In 2023, we announced the expansion of our footprint across the U.S. with a 275,000-square-foot facility in Palatine, Illinois. This facility, expected to be fully operational this year, expands our capacity and enables us to meet the growing demand for our technology.
As we grow, sustainability is a significant consideration in construction, upgrades, and enhancements. We are pleased Palatine will achieve LEED certification and be fully enabled for electric-vehicle charging.
Finally, on our Chicago campus, we unveiled the Arlys Conrad Memorial Park and Native Pollinator Gardens. The 12,500-square-foot garden is open to the public and includes 45 plant species, many of which provide a habitat for essential pollinators. We embrace our core value and guiding principle of Responsible Stewardship in our communities by supporting activities such as the native garden, recycling events, volunteer efforts, and, more broadly, through the S&C Fund. Through this fund, we donated over $1 million to more than 50 organizations in 2023.
On behalf of S&C, I want to thank our team members for their excellent work and commitment to S&C and our customers.
To our customers and partners, I thank you for your collaboration, support, and trust. Together, we will transform the grid and advance an outage-free, sustainable electrical energy future.
Read more about our sustainability efforts in our 2023 Sustainability Report.