2011 Performance Summary: Minimize Our Environmental Impact

This section provides a summary of the results for the 2011 National Instruments corporate responsibility commitments. To learn more about the company’s performance and commitments, visit the sections linked from this summary. A letter from the company’s CEO, Dr. James Truchard, also summarizes the company’s efforts in 2011.

To locate a specific Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) indicator in this report, refer to the GRI Index.

Legend

	Fulfilled commitment
	Partially fulfilled or currently in progress
	No progress

Area	2011 Commitment	2011 Performance	Status
Product Life Cycle	Pilot new criteria for a supplier scorecard to measure supplier citizenship.	Did not fulfill this commitment. After a reassessment of critical needs, NI reallocated the procurement resources scheduled to work on the scorecard to a supplier packaging improvement project instead, which delayed the scorecard.
	Identify gaps and implement improvements for an OHSAS 18001-capable process.	Did not fulfill this commitment. An increase in employee turnover in the safety group at NI Hungary created a challenge in getting approvers to release the emergency response plan documents necessary to fulfill this commitment.
	Reduce polyurethane in product packaging by 30% per unit using eco-friendly materials.	Received more customer orders than expected for a product line that uses more polyurethane than other products. This caused more usage than planned at the Austin site, but globally NI reduced usage by 24%.
Conserving Resources	Implement employee PC power management program at Hungary and Costa Rica branches.	Implemented on 295 PCs at the Hungary site. The program was somewhat limited in manufacturing because PCs cannot be turned off due to production equipment needs.
	Audit HVAC control systems of each corporate headquarters building for improvements.	Completed the audit and recommended areas for improvement in 2012.
	Use Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) criteria to investigate effective energy- and water-saving strategies in the design and development of the new NI facility in Penang, Malaysia.	Building completion for 2012 is on schedule and NI is implementing the LEED strategy as planned.
	Optimize waste management costs at Hungary branch.	NI Hungary reduced communal waste collection by 9%.
Employees Driving Change	Investigate ways to increase employee ridership of commuter rail.	Local transportation authority in Austin canceled a connector bus route for headquarters employees who use commuter rail due to low ridership.
Employees Driving Change	Evaluate electronic waste to be reused in conjunction with Goodwill recycling program.	In 2012, NI plans to redirect electronic waste to a Goodwill recycling program so materials can be reused when possible.