Busch Entertainment Launches New Sustainability Initiatives

October 31, 2008

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Busch Entertainment Corp. owner of SeaWorld and Busch Garderns, announced new sustainability initiatives.

The company says that all seafood served to guests, and even the salmon fed to Shamu at SeaWorld Orlando, will be purchased from sustainably-managed fisheries that promote environmentally responsible stewardship. The move will affect more than 220,000 pounds of seafood and is on track for completion by early 2009.

All plastic utensils and plates used by the company’s park restaurants will be made from renewable resources such as sugarcane and vegetable starch, replacing 12.5 million pieces of dinnerware that the parks dispose of annually.

At SeaWorld Orlando, the company is using two new hydrogen-fueled guest shuttles, which the company says delivers almost a 100 percent reduction in CO2 compared to gasoline engines.

The company also announced new recycling programs:

- Busch Gardens Williamsburg employs a new single-stream recycling process in which every piece of recyclable material is removed by hand. This program keeps more than 1,340 tons of trash out of area landfills.

- At Discovery Cove in Orlando, feathers shed through molting by the park’s birds are collected and donated to the Feather Distribution Project, a program in which they are reused by the Pueblo tribe of the southwestern U.S. in traditional religious ceremonies, reducing the illegal trade in endangered macaws.

- Busch Gardens Tampa recycles traditional materials like plastics and metals, and even 3 million pounds of animal manure each year.

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