EPA applauds top corporate green power users

RP news wires, Noria Corporation
Tags: energy management

In response to EPA’s nationwide challenge issued in December 2006, 53 Fortune 500 corporations are now collectively purchasing more than six billion kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power annually. These purchases surpassed the goals set by EPA’s Green Power Partnership by 130 percent and equal the avoided carbon dioxide emissions of more than 570 million gallons of gasoline each year or the equivalent amount of electricity needed to power nearly 670,000 average American homes annually.

“EPA applauds our Fortune 500 partners for protecting our environment by purchasing green power,” said EPA Administrator Stephen L. Johnson. “By voluntarily shifting to renewable energy, EPA’s environmental partners are proving you don’t need to wait for a signal in order to go green.”

Intel Corporation leads the group as the top buyer with a purchase of 1.3 billion kilowatt-hours per year. PepsiCo is second, followed by Wells Fargo & Company, Whole Foods Market, The Pepsi Bottling Group, and Johnson & Johnson. Cisco Systems and Kohl’s Department Stores recently made sizable purchase increases to place them at seventh and eighth on the list, respectively. Rounding out the top ten green power purchases are Starbucks and DuPont Company.

EPA's Green Power Partnership works with more than 850 partner organizations to buy green power voluntarily as a way to reduce the environmental impacts associated with conventional electricity use and to support the development of new, renewable generation resources nationwide. Overall, EPA Green Power Partners are buying more than 13 billion kWh of green power annually.

Green power is generated from renewable resources such as solar, wind, geothermal, biomass and biogas, as well as low-impact hydropower. Green power resources produce electricity with an environmental profile superior to conventional power technologies and produce no net increase to greenhouse gas emissions.

Below is the final ranking of EPA’s Fortune 500 Green Power Challenge, listed in descending order of purchase size.

Rank

Partner Organization

Green Power
(kilowatt–hours/year)

1

Intel Corporation

1,300,000,000

2

PepsiCo

1,105,045,154

3

Wells Fargo & Company

550,000,000

4

Whole Foods Market

509,104,786

5

The Pepsi Bottling Group, Inc.

457,851,838

6

Johnson & Johnson

400,702,978

7

Cisco Systems, Inc.

373,500,000

8

Kohl's Department Stores

236,017,000

9

Starbucks

185,000,000

10

DuPont Company

180,063,500

11

Staples

121,800,000

12

IBM Corporation

110,103,000

13

Office Depot

99,529,000

14

Safeway Inc.

90,000,000

15

Sprint Nextel

87,600,000

16

Lowe's

86,000,000

17

Nike, Inc.

79,820,000

18

FedEx Kinko's

76,312,000

19

Citi

56,398,000

20

Advanced Micro Devices / Austin, TX Facilities

53,518,623

21

Hewlett-Packard

50,000,000

22

The Estee Lauder Companies Inc. / Operations

36,000,000

23 (tie)

Liz Claiborne, Inc. / NJ Corporate Headquarters

25,000,000

23 (tie)

Lockheed Martin Corporate Headquarters Buildings

25,000,000

23 (tie)

State Street Corporation

25,000,000

26

Baxter International Inc.

20,500,000

27

Applied Materials, Inc.

19,420,000

28

GE Healthcare / Headquarters

15,816,820

29

ARAMARK Parks & Resorts

15,455,000

30

General Motors / Service Parts Operations

14,050,000

31

Dell, Inc.

12,996,000

32

Macy's, Inc. West Division

10,400,000

33

State Farm / Austin Operations Center

9,651,642

34

Apple Computers / Austin, TX Facilities

9,408,700

35

The Coca-Cola Company

6,100,000

36

Oracle Corporation / Austin Facility

5,400,000

37

United Parcel Service (UPS) / 4 CA Facilities

2,949,545

38 (tie)

Pitney Bowes

2,500,000

38 (tie)

Raytheon / Aurora, CO

2,500,000

40

Roche / Palo Alto & Pleasanton Sites

2,230,997

41

Lockheed Martin / Palo Alto Facilities

1,800,000

42 (tie)

Agilent Technologies / Santa Clara location

1,608,000

42 (tie)

Yahoo! Inc. / Santa Clara Sites

1,608,000

44

Time Warner Cable - Central Texas

1,500,000

45

FedEx Express / Oakland Hub Facility

1,172,430

46

3M / Austin, TX Facilities

1,144,000

47

GE Healthcare Technologies - Surgery

840,000

48

Autoliv / Ogden Facility

711,000

49

GE Money - Corporate Payment Services

678,000

50

Monsanto / Agracetus Campus

399,000

51

John Deere Co. / Dallas, TX Facility

154,333

52

Lockheed Martin / Plant 1 - Sunnyvale, CA

80,000

53

GE Energy / Inspection & Repair Services

72,000


Today, EPA also announced an update to its other Top Partner lists, including its National Top 25 list, which includes 11 Fortune 500 Green Power Challenge partners. The U.S. Air Force moved back up to No. 3 nationally. HSBC North America jumped to the 10th spot, by recently increasing its green power purchase to 300 million kilowatt hours per year. New to the National Top 25 list are two
Texas cities — the City of Dallas at No. 9 and the City of Houston at No. 12.

For added information on EPA's Fortune 500 Green Power Challenge please visit
http://www.epa.gov/greenpower/partners/fortune500.htm.

For added information on EPA’s National Top 25 list of green power purchasers please visit:
http://www.epa.gov/greenpower/toplists/top25.htm.