TexaStone Quarries Named First Company to Meet NSC Sustainability Standards

TexaStone Quarries, based in Garden City, Texas, is the first company to achieve the level of certified stone producer under new sustainability standards. The creation of the program – ANSI/NSC-373 Sustainable Production of Natural Dimension Stone – was completed earlier this year, following several years of development using the consensus-based American National Standards Institute (ANSI) process. Achieving the voluntary standards allows six quarries operated by the company to receive “Gold” certification, and its closely-allied fabrication plant to receive a “Silver” certification. The certifications came after facility inspections and paperwork verification by NSF Sustainability. And, there are reportedly several other stone companies that have begun the certification process.

The ANSI/NSC 373 standards cover nine facets of a quarrier and fabricator’s operation, including water usage and recycling, custody and transportation, site and plant management, land reclamation and adaptive use, corporate governance, energy use and conservation, management of excess process materials and waste, safer chemical and materials management and human and health considerations. There is also an optional “innovations” standard. There also are chain-of-custody certification standards for stone distributors.

Four levels of certification are available for quarriers and fabricators: bronze, silver, gold and platinum. Each individual entity can be certified individually. Transparent, credible standards and independent third-party certification are important to those in the construction industry seeking more sustainable stone products. This includes local, state and federal government agencies and others seeking to comply with U.S. Executive Order 13514, which sets a goal for 95 percent of government contracts to include products and services with sustainable attributes, as well as a U.S. General Services Administration standard for sustainable construction (GSA PBS-P100 facilities standards for the public building service).

There are 18 requirements under ANSI/NSC-373 with a total of 41 possible points. The more points a company earns, the higher designation it receives. The maximum points will earn the platinum level. Companies can upgrade to higher levels by improving in various areas of the program, and each facility must be re-certified every four years.

“The growing ‘green’ movement required us to develop standards that allow us to compare out products with others in the marketplace,” said Duke Pointer, Natural Stone Council (NSC) executive director. “Certification of TexaStone as a sustainable producer of natural dimension-stone products is a major milestone for NSC’s nearly five-year program to develop sustainability standards that dovetail with natural stone’s inherent qualities of beauty, durability and variety.”

“The industry wanted to identify how the stone was processed from the quarries and the processors,” said Tom Bruursema, general manager of NSF Sustainability. “As the first to earn certification to ANSI/NSC 373, TexaStone leads its industry in adopting more sustainable practices that help its customers and organizations meet the continued growth in green buildings.”