Our Commitment to Environmental Stewardship

As a global corporate citizen, BioMarin strives to operate in ways that protect the environment and contribute to the health of our employees and communities. We have a long history of reducing our environmental footprint through the comprehensive efforts here.

Increasing energy efficiencies and reducing greenhouse gas emissions

We have demonstrated our commitment to this by:

  • Actively designing and renovating facilities to be energy efficient and embrace the highest standards articulated by green building rating systems. All U.S. building construction and renovation projects meet either LEED Gold certification requirements from the U.S. Green Building Council or CALGreen building code requirements from the State of California in place at the time of project execution.
  • Purchasing 100% of our electricity for our Marin County campuses from Marin Clean Energy, with more than 60% of BioMarin’s electricity for our these campuses generated from renewable sources such as wind and solar.
  • Reducing water consumption and improving efficiency of water utilities through use of innovative technologies, including computerized sensors and automatic isolation valves.
  • Achieving ISO 50001 certification for our Shanbally, Ireland energy management system (EnMS) in 2017 and maintain the accreditation to date. The EnMS provides a formal framework for lowering thermal and electrical energy use and reducing GHG emissions through development of targets as well as regular audits and activity reviews.
  • Implementing a clean, natural-gas-fired co-generation system at our Novato manufacturing facility. This system captures heat from generators to produce the steam used in our production processes and is capable of generating 2 MW of electricity.
  • Installing a photovoltaic system comprised of 434 solar panels on the roof of our San Rafael campus parking structure. The system produces approximately 115 kWh of power – nearly equal to the electricity needed to power the 161 EV charging stations and other systems and equipment in the structure.

Conservation Programs and Initiatives

We have contributed to conservation efforts by:

  • Revitalizing a downtown San Rafael brownfield (a former PG&E Manufactured Gas Plant site) through a $17 million remediation to remove toxic materials. The revitalized site will support the expansion of our San Rafael campus and – through our donation of a portion of the site to community nonprofit organizations – an active aging center and affordable senior housing.
  • Maintaining efforts to exclude conflict minerals, such as gold, tungsten, tin and tantalum, from our products and supply chain.
  • Safely and securely disposing of unused or unwanted medications and medical waste (click here for more information about the safe disposal of sharps).
  • Providing training and information for our employees around the world on chemical substances, hazardous substances and hazardous waste.
  • Offering a variety of reduce, reuse, recycle and composting programs throughout our global facilities and prioritizing beneficial reuse, energy recovery and reduction of waste to landfills. Examples include recycling cardboard and reusable containers for bioprocessing materials, redirecting copper sulfate and zinc sulfate solutions for metals recycling, donating surplus laboratory equipment to local schools and colleges, and donating freezers for COVID-19 related vaccine distribution.
  • Offering an Employee Commuter Program in Northern California that provides comprehensive incentives – including flexible work hours, electric vehicle charging stations, rideshare options, and support for public transportation expenses – designed to cut back on the number of vehicles on roadways and reduce emissions.

Global Trade and Transport

BioMarin manages our operations and global supply chain in compliance with applicable export, import and trade compliance laws, including those related to trade embargoes and economic sanctions, export control, boycott, cargo security, import classification and valuation, origin, marking and free trade agreements

Supplier Code of Conduct

At BioMarin, we expect our suppliers to operate according to the same ethical and environmentally sustainable principles we hold for our business. Our Supplier Code of Conduct highlights our expectations that suppliers enforce safe working conditions, treat their workers with respect and dignity, and utilize sound and environmentally sustainable business practices.

Supply Chain Labor Transparency

We are committed to supporting fair and just labor practices by keeping our global supply chain and operations free of human trafficking, human slavery and forced labor. For more information or to view our statement regarding human trafficking, see BioMarin’s California Transparency in Supply Chains and UK Modern Slavery Act Statement.

Product Quality and Safety

We comply with all regulations and laws pertaining to reporting on adverse events (AE) and special situation events (SSE). Any BioMarin employee who becomes aware of an AE or SSE must forward certain enumerated information within one business day to the Pharmacovigilance department.

Clinical Trials Practices

BioMarin is committed to the safety of patients and meeting all GxP regulations and policies.

  • Good Laboratory Practices
  • Human Subject Protection in Clinical Research
    • BioMarin-sponsored clinical trials are designed and conducted in accordance with all applicable laws and regulations.
    • Policies on ethical research are regularly reviewed and updated.
    • A monitoring and review system is in place.
    • All BioMarin-sponsored clinical trials are prospectively reviewed by a qualified Institutional Review Board or Independent Ethics Committee.

Responsible Sales and Marketing

BioMarin is committed to fair competition as a matter of corporate conduct. We abide by all laws that apply to marketing activities, including prohibiting:

  • False or misleading advertising
  • Bribery of competitors’ or customers’ employees
  • Unfair comments about competitors’ products

Our Commitment to Transparency in Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Reporting

BioMarin is committed to understanding the impact of our business practices on the environment and managing our global emissions footprint. We further recognize the importance of understanding our climate-related risks and acknowledging our stakeholders’ interests in our plans to continue ensuring we prioritize minimizing our impact on the environment.

Our campuses consist of multiple manufacturing facilities that produce biologic and gene therapies and perform important pilot scale work, in addition to laboratories, warehouses and office space supporting our clinical development and commercial initiatives.

 

For 2020, activities at the two campuses generated the above GHG emissions

BioMarin developed and implemented a standard for the collection and verification of GHG data that aligns reporting of this information with the Principles for Effective Disclosure section of the Recommendations of the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD) and the GHG Protocol.

BioMarin has also begun to assess the most impactful and cost-efficient mitigation strategies to minimize our carbon footprint.

1 Data covers all buildings within our operational control at our Northern California and Shanbally campuses. Sources of Scope 1 emissions from our campuses include combustion of fuels by stationary equipment, releases of refrigerants and laboratory use of chemicals.

2 The location-based figure we have reported for our Scope 2 emissions is based on the amount of electricity purchased and the average emissions intensity of the grids on which our energy consumption occurs. It does not account for the fact that we purchase electricity for all of our campuses that is generated from renewable sources like wind and solar.

3 Emissions associated with our Northern California campuses were calculated in accordance with the GHG Protocol and methodologies at US 40 CFR 98 and 17 CCR 95000 et seq., and by utilizing EPA eGRID emission factors.

4 Emissions associated with our Shanbally campus were calculated in accordance with the GHG Protocol and by utilizing common conversion factors for energy use in Ireland (https://www.seai.ie/data-and-insights/seai-statistics/conversion-factors/).

5 2020 figures have been updated to include all of our Northern California campuses within our operational control. Previously published figures only included emissions from our Novato and Shanbally manufacturing campuses.

6 Total Scope 1 + 2 GHG emissions have stayed relatively flat despite an increase in manufacturing capacity at our Shanbally campus. GHG reduction initiatives, such as conversion to LED lighting, have balanced increases in emissions from new bioreactors and packaging suites, in addition to a new fill finish facility and a cold chain storage building.