Charleston Regional Development Alliance

Berkeley, Charleston & Dorchester Counties

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The Noisette Project acquires consultation services of two Fortune 500 heavy-hitters

Oct. 1, 2002
Charleston Regional Business Journal
By Dennis Quick
The Noisette Project, the $1 billion, 3,000-acre North Charleston redevelopment effort, recently acquired the consultation services of two Fortune 500 heavy-hitters—Ray C. Anderson, chairman and CEO of Interface Inc., the world’s largest producer of commercial floor coverings, and Peter M. Wege, who grew Steelcase Inc. into the world’s largest office furniture manufacturer.

In addition to being strong corporate leaders, Anderson and Wege are stout environmentalists and energy conservationists. Environmentalism and energy conservation are at the core of what Noisette Co. President and CEO John Knott Jr. calls “sustainability,” in which a community is viewed holistically as one living system, with each of its components— from building materials to ecology to infrastructure—connected to and dependent upon one another.

Anderson and Wege are sustainability experts. Anderson wrote Mid-Course Correction Toward a Sustainable Enterprise: The Interface Model, about how Interface Inc.’s bottom line increased when the company’s energy consumption decreased. Wege authored the book Economicology: The Eleventh Commandment, a guide for combining economics and ecology to foster resources more efficiently.

“The success of a business should be measured by the health of its employees and by its environmental footprint,” Anderson emphasizes.

When Noisette construction gets underway, Anderson and Wege will advise the Noisette team on creating not just a revitalized community but an environmentally healthy, cost-effective one. They hope sustainability will become a concept businesses nationwide will follow.

“Noisette is doing the right thing, and we want to be a part of it,” says Wege.
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