Every quarter, the US Environmental Protection Agency updates its Green Power rankings for US businesses and communities making investments in renewable energy.
Rather than buying renewable energy credits (RECs), these leaders are making direct investments in on-site generation, ramping up the percentage of their total energy that comes from renewables.
Walmart currently tops the list, followed by BMW, Coca-Cola, the US Airforce and Kohl’s Department Stores.
Even though Walmart uses far more renewable energy than any other corporation – mostly solar and wind – it still supplies just 1% of its mammoth annual energy demand. 175 million kilowatt hours (kWh) of renewables are generated across its stores, compared to 71 million kWh at BMW, which comes in second.
Still, BMW Manufacturing gets an impressive 38% of electricity from on-site renewables, mostly from biogas.
Coca-Cola Refreshments gets 6% of electricity from renewables; the US Air Force gets less than 1% and Kohl’s gets 2%.
Kohl’s leads among EPA’s Top 20 Retailers for using renewables overall. Between on-site resources and REC purchases, it sources 105% of its electricity from renewables.
And once again, Intel leads the National Top 50 – a position it has held since 2008.
The District of Columbia heads among the Top 20 Local Governments ranking, eclipsing the City of Houston, which led the list last year.
EPA’s Green Power Partnership works with 1,300 organizations that voluntarily use green power – more than half of them are small businesses and nonprofits.
Here are the latest Green Power rankings:
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Iiving and working in “Green” Munich, that uses both garbage incineration for long distance heat and power, and sewage sludge methane digesters, it is good to know that everything I throw into the garbage and flush down the toilet helps to power industries located in Munich, such as Siemens and B.M.w.