COLUMBIA, Md., Nov. 3, 2014 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- via PRWEB - On Thursday, October 30, 2014 at a ceremony to commemorate the opening of its new 90,000-square-foot global headquarters here, W. R. Grace & Co. (NYSE: GRA) announced that the building has been certified by the U.S. Green Building Council as LEED Silver (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design).
Pictured here during the ceremony with the LEED Silver plaque are (left to right): Maryland Deputy Secretary for the Environment David Costello, Grace Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Fred Festa, and Maryland Secretary of Business and Economic Development Dominick Murray.
Designed and constructed to strict environmental standards, the three-story office building incorporated many products from the Grace Construction Products division, including waterproofing, fireproofing and concrete materials. Among the sustainable design features are a pervious concrete parking area, high-efficiency lighting and HVAC, and systems to reuse storm water for irrigation.
The new building is the centerpiece of the company's 160-acre campus in Columbia. When Grace opened a research and development facility here in 1958, it was the largest industrial chemicals research center in Maryland. The company moved its global headquarters to the site in 1999 where today nearly 600 employees provide business leadership as well as multi-tiered research and development, technical service and analytical support to customers around the world.
About Grace
Built on talent, technology, and trust, Grace is a leading global supplier of catalysts; engineered and packaging materials; and specialty construction chemicals and building materials. The company's three industry-leading business segments--Grace Catalysts Technologies, Grace Materials Technologies, and Grace Construction Products--provide innovative products, technologies, and services that improve the products and processes of our customer partners in over 155 countries around the world. Grace employs approximately 6,800 people including 1,200 in Maryland, in over 40 countries. Grace's 2013 net sales were $3.1 billion. More information about Grace is available at grace.com.
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This announcement contains forward-looking statements, that is, information related to future, not past, events. Such statements generally include the words "believes," "plans," "intends," "targets," "will," "expects," "suggests," "anticipates," "outlook," "continues" or similar expressions. Forward-looking statements include, without limitation, expected financial positions; results of operations; cash flows; financing plans; business strategy; operating plans; capital and other expenditures; competitive positions; growth opportunities for existing products; benefits from new technology and cost reduction initiatives, plans and objectives; and markets for securities. For these statements, Grace claims the protection of the safe harbor for forward-looking statements contained in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Like other businesses, Grace is subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause its actual results to differ materially from its projections or that could cause other forward-looking statements to prove incorrect. Factors that could cause actual results to materially differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements include, without limitation: risks related to foreign operations, especially in emerging regions, including currency exchange rate changes; the cost and availability of raw materials and energy; the effectiveness of its research and development and growth investments; acquisitions and divestitures of assets and gains and losses from dispositions; developments affecting Grace's funded and unfunded pension obligations; its legal and environmental proceedings; costs of compliance with environmental regulation; and those additional factors set forth in Grace's most recent Annual Report on Form 10-K, quarterly report on Form 10-Q and current reports on Form 8-K, which have been filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission and are readily available on the Internet at http://www.sec.gov. Reported results should not be considered as an indication of future performance. Readers are cautioned not to place undue reliance on Grace's projections and forward-looking statements, which speak only as the date thereof. Grace undertakes no obligation to publicly release any revision to the projections and forward-looking statements contained in this announcement, or to update them to reflect events or circumstances occurring after the date of this announcement.
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