Making a Dental Office Carbon Neutral When Scott Andersen and his partners established Artisan Dental in Madison, Wisconsin, in 2014, they incorporated a range of energy saving strategies right from the start. “We purchased Energy Star appliances and computers,” says Andersen. “We installed motion sensing light switches in rooms. We chose a facility with an abundance of natural daylight with south-facing exposure.” Each year, Andersen and the dentists at the practice (including his spouse Dr. Nicole Andersen) meet to set new strategic goals for the practice. “In our mission statement, we set out to create health and happiness for five different stakeholder groups; our patients, team members, suppliers and contractors, local and global community and the environment,” he says. “We consider the environment to be a stakeholder in our practice because it provides our business with necessary inputs. Clean air, clean water, and nutrient rich soil.” One year, the environmental goal was to purchase 100% of the practice’s electricity from renewable sources. “That reduced Scott Andersen is the co-founder and director of stakeholder stewardship of ArtisanDental, a Certified BCorporation in Madison,Wisconsin. The multi-step process that one dental practice used to become environmentally sustainable 20 | 2023 | Issue 1
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