Alcoa Foundation in Partnership with the Institute for Sustainable Communities - EHS Academy in China

NEW YORK & BEIJING--March 21, 2011: Alcoa Foundation has joined a strategic partnership with the Institute for Sustainable Communities and other worldwide companies to support the Environment, Health and Safety (EHS) Academy in China's Guangdong and Jiangsu provinces.

“Through its courses and certification, the EHS Academy will be able to meet the corporate demand for people with EHS training and expertise”

The EHS Academy's customized, intensive trainings prepare plant managers to apply international best practices in EHS management, reduce workplace injuries, effectively measure and lower energy consumption, and lower greenhouse gas and other harmful emissions.

"Through its courses and certification, the EHS Academy will be able to meet the corporate demand for people with EHS training and expertise," said Jinya Chen, President, Alcoa Asia and Pacific Region. "The good news is that the demand reflects how more and more companies are valuing EHS in the same way as Alcoa."

In addition to financial support, Alcoa is providing factory systems and EHS curriculum, based on its own international best practices; promoting the Academy among its peers; and helping to train the EHS Academy's master trainers.

The EHS Academy is ground-breaking not just for its health and environmental benefits, but also for the public-private partnership that makes it possible. The partnership includes Chinese and U.S. government agencies, nonprofit and educational institutions, and multinational corporations and foundations, including the GE Foundation.

"This partnership is more than the sum of its parts," said George Hamilton, president of the Institute for Sustainable Communities. "It is transforming the way Chinese companies and government, multinational corporations, and nonprofits grapple with environmental health and safety issues while helping to achieve significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions."

More than 2,300 factory managers have already been trained at the first EHS Academy at Sun Yat-sen University's prestigious Lingnan College business school in Guangdong. ISC and its partners have also worked with the Chinese government to develop a professional EHS certification protocol, which will be implemented nationally in 2011.

Based on these initial successes, Alcoa helped launch the second EHS Academy at Nanjing University in Jiangsu last week. Once both Academies are fully operational, they will train more than 4,000 factory managers annually.