US Top 20 Green Power Purchasers

National Top 50

 

Combined, these top 50 largest purchases amount to more than 12.3 billion kilowatt-hours annually, which represents more than 70 percent of the green power commitments made by all EPA Green Power Partners.

• Current and Past Partner Lists

As of July 6, 2010

The Green Power Partnership works with a wide variety of leading organizations — from Fortune 500 companies to local, state and federal governments, and a growing number of colleges and universities. The following Top Partner Rankings highlight the annual green power purchases of leading organizations within the United States and across individual industry sectors.

These green power purchases help reduce the environmental impacts of electricity use and support the development of new renewable generation capacity nationwide. Purchase amounts reflect U.S. operations only and are sourced from U.S.-based green power resources. Organizations can meet EPA purchase requirements using any combination of three different product options (1) Renewable Energy Certificates, (2) On-site generation, and (3) Utility green power products.

Purchase figures are based on annualized Partner contract amounts (kilowatt-hours), not calendar year totals. These rankings are updated on a quarterly schedule. Find out how your organization can partner with EPA today! To view a top partner list, select from the chart below:

Annual Green Power Usage (kWh)	GP % of Total Electricity Use*	Green Power Resources	Providers (listed in descending order by kWh supplied to Partner)
1. Kohl's Department Stores
1,367,376,000	100%	Biogas, Biomass, Small-hydro, Solar, Wind	3Degrees°, WM Renewable Energy°, On-site Generation, Sacramento Municipal Utility District°, City of Dover
2. Whole Foods Market
817,657,623	100%	Solar, Wind	3Degrees°, Austin Energy, On-site Generation
3. Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. / California and Texas Facilities
263,533,433	8%	Biogas, Solar, Wind	Duke Energy, On-site Generation
4. Starbucks
237,000,000	25%	Wind	3Degrees°, NextEra Energy Resources°
5. Staples
146,625,408	22%	Biogas, Solar, Wind	Sterling Planet°, Avista Utilities, Pacific Power°, Tennessee Valley Authority°, Portland General Electric, Constellation NewEnergy°
6. Lowe's
110,950,000	2%	Biomass, Solar	Nexant°, On-site Generation
7. Safeway Inc.
94,500,000	3%	Solar, Wind	3Degrees°, Nexant°, On-site Generation
8. REI
63,875,704	101%	Biomass, Small-hydro, Solar, Wind	Bonneville Environmental Foundation, Gexa Energy°, Green Mountain Energy°, Xcel Energy°, On-site Generation, Austin Energy, Eugene Water & Electric Board°, We Energies°, Alliant Energy°
9. H-E-B Grocery Company
63,000,000	5%	Biogas, Wind	Austin Energy, CPS Energy
10. The Estée Lauder Companies Inc. / Operations
36,000,000	100%	Wind	Community Energy°
11. FedEx Office
34,215,909	14%	Various	Various
12. Gander Mountain
19,000,000	16%	Biomass, Wind	Renewable Choice Energy°
13. Giant Eagle, Inc.
17,000,000	3%	Wind	Constellation NewEnergy°
14. The North Face
16,592,000	100%	Wind	Bonneville Environmental Foundation°
15. Aveda Corporation
15,718,240	100%	Wind	Xcel Energy°, Native Energy°
16. Office Depot
15,500,000	2%	Wind	NextEra Energy Resources°
17. prAna
12,400,000	100%	Wind	3Degrees°
18. Half Price Books / Texas Facilities
11,329,695	100%	Wind	Green Mountain Energy°
19. Macy's, Inc. / California and Hawaii Stores
10,400,000	3%	Solar	On-site Generation
20. Origins
7,196,000	100%	Wind	Community Energy°

*Reflects the amount of green power as a percentage of total purchased electricity use. Partners choosing to purchase green power in an amount exceeding 100 percent of their U.S. organization-wide electricity use are listed as such.

°Indicates Provider is selling Partner a third-party certified green power product. For more information on third-party certification, visit http://www.epa.gov/greenpower/buygp/certified.htm.

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Scott's Contracting
scottscontracting@gmail.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.blogspot.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.com
scotty@stlouisrenewableenergy.com

The Myth in Food Costs and Ethanol

Food vs. Fuel – A Reversal by the World Bank

In a 180-degree turn from its previous position, the World Bank now says that spikes in grocery prices from 2007 to 2008 were not the fault of ethanol and other biofuels. The World Bank's new report concludes exactly what Growth Energy has been saying for the last two years: the food-versus-fuel debate is myth.

While the newest report is a complete about-face from the 2008 Policy Research Working Paper, we at Growth Energy are wondering when the World Bank executives will actually admit that they were wrong two years ago when they claimed that ethanol's use of grain was pushing up grocery prices. The newest report correctly points out that, in fact, it is the price of oil and other fossil fuels, as well as rampant market speculation, that played the most significant role in increasing food prices – not ethanol.

Unfortunately, ethanol's critics have used the now-debunked World Bank study from 2008 to perpetuate the food-versus-fuel myth. Big Food and Big Oil have continuously cited the 2008 study more than any other to support their position on food-versus-fuel. In fact, this complete reversal by the World Bank confirms that food-versus-fuel has always been and will always be nothing more than a myth.

We are hopeful that this report will encourage others who have relentlessly perpetuated this untruth to admit their mistakes and put an end to this false debate.

http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/blog/post/2010/08/food-vs-fuel-a-reversal-by-the-world-bank?cmpid=WNL-Tuesday-August3-2010

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Scott's Contracting
scottscontracting@gmail.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.blogspot.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.com
scotty@stlouisrenewableenergy.com

Grandfathering Our Problems, Blocking Our Solutions

Posted on August 2, 2010
Ken Zweibel

Grandfathering Our Problems, Blocking Our Solutions

The United States has a peculiar problem adopting necessary change. With so many constituencies to palliate, the almost-universal solution is to avoid conflict where possible and payoff the constituencies where not.
This can run up quite a bill, in both dollar and procedural terms.
We have a society full of bad, worm-eaten decisions. Look no further than drilling in deep water when you don't know how to deal with leaks; heaping all the risks of nuclear accidents and disposal on society so we can keep doing nuclear; getting ready to sweep under the rug issues with shale gas, our newest familiar energy savior; and the worst of them all, sustaining a perpetual co-dependency with our oil suppliers in the Mideast. And I haven't even mentioned global warming.

Sometimes we try to come to grips with our energy problems. Our political solutions can look pretty ugly. They basically say, ok, we can't change what we have been doing (think, Clean Air Act and existing coal plants), but we can make it really hard for any NEW facility to meet much more stringent requirements. This 'art of the possible' solution creates a procrustean foundation of bad practices and a stimulus to keep them going the way they are as long as possible. We have "grandfathered" our problems.
In the meantime, because business as usual sucks so much, we create a core of heroic environmental lawyers who sue every living representative of the energy establishment. They make every effort to find ways to stop conventional energy projects. And they win most of the time, because this is really what society (and its judges) wants. Thus we have developed a substantial bulk of case law that backs preventing new power plants or transmission, all designed to stop conventional energy.

Now along comes solar energy. Along comes wind and solar as solutions to our problems. What happens? Everything gets stopped dead in its tracks by the same case law!

Even the most hallucinatory green lawyer would not argue that solar and wind are the same as natural gas drilling and coal power plants. But the same case law gets asserted against them. BrightSource's half-gigawatt Ivanpah solar thermal plant gets delayed by the same desert tortoise as a coal plant. Someone's wind or solar transmission line looks like it won't go in anyone's back yard because of prior successes blocking transmission lines meant for nuclear and coal plants. First Solar's half-gigawatt Topaz PV project, which uses no water and just sits there, gets the same treatment as any power plant. And no one knows if they will be sued even if they meet every existing regulation. Stand by for another half decade of debilitating delays while the rest of the world moves ahead!

We have grandfathered our problems and blocked our solutions. We can site new deep water drilling in the Gulf, because "so many people depend on it" (who are not fishermen); but we can't site 10,000 MWs of new solar in the desert. What is wrong with us? Are we stupid? Or do we simply have to give credence to everybody's individual whine, without judging their relative merits? Yes, we are ignorant as well as stupid, or at least that's how we act.
We have a bureaucracy full of well-meaning people who examine the grindstone in front of them, and cannot sit back far enough to realize the tiny space of legal resistance they live by is standing in the way of the far greater societal, economic, and environmental good we are trying to put in place. In Washington, facilitating a project means adding focus on it (presumably to make it happen sooner), with the almost certain result that more signatures will be needed and more angels dancing on the head of a pin will be counted.
Meanwhile public angst fired by petro-dollars can carry the day with every conventional energy solution, like sustaining our drilling in the Gulf or our oil addiction in the other Gulf.

Without decisive leadership from the President, this will continue. Only the President can cut this Gordian knot.
Ken Zweibel

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Scott's Contracting
scottscontracting@gmail.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.blogspot.com
http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.com
scotty@stlouisrenewableenergy.com

Interesting Article-Gila Bend-US Solar Future

Not Just Another Solar Deal - Why Gila Bend Could Be Pioneering The Future For U.S. Solar

A major solar farm being built in Arizona by an American developer on American land. It all adds up to a brighter future and more jobs here in the U.S.

Pacific Blue Energy Corp. (OTCBB: PBEC), announced today that the city of Gila Bend, Arizona has shown them a commitment to fast-track a 150 Megawatt solar farm on about 100 acres of land there. Claiming favorable permitting laws, and more importantly... "strong support from town officials and staff" they're going to be able to expedite the Phase 1 approvals for the project in just two to four months. This is an amazing feat considering that many solar installations of this scale can get stuck in red tape and generally sit for at least two years.

Is the U.S. finally getting serious about it's commitment to solar electricity? Maybe this is a sign that we're doing just that. Also, this underscores one of the most important things to know about solar. The fact that the value of adding more solar power to our infrastructure and creating a clean energy economy based on solar and other technologies is favored across party lines.

Yes, we still face an avalanche of problems at the Federal level, and with election cycles in the U.S. coming every two years it's difficult to get politicians to commit to something that may not sit well with their constituents or biggest donors. Still, the path is getting clearer and clearer with every new project. More and more, people from both sides of the aisle are coming together to make these projects work. Why? because they know that solar creates jobs, and solar jobs are high-paying and sustainable - and that means more people paying more taxes. . .

Of course, let's not discount the other benefits of building large scale solar power plants such as this one. The energy this plant produces can power up to 30,000 homes. That means lower electricity bills down the road, and less dependence on foreign energy right away. These two issues are of the highest importance to all voters, and this makes it important to keep improving the processes for getting renewable energy, and particularly solar, zoned, permitted, and developed. It's a sure bet for winning votes.

In a perfect world, the demand for solar and the interest in large-scale deployment in the U.S. would be driven more by awareness of the people, concern for our environment, and for long-term competitiveness with other nations who are currently winning the race to overcome the obstacles created by our dependence on fossil fuels. Nevertheless, we should see the aggressive action by Gila Bend as a sign that the end game of rapid deployment can become a reality fast, even here in the congested, political, U.S. market, regardless of the means or the motivations. It's now up to us to monitor the progress Pacific Blue is making in Gila Bend, and to hold accountable everyone who made the promise of supporting and fast-tracking this project. Indeed, every victory counts, and inevitably leads to another.

More on this, and how the U.S. is stacking up against other countries in deploying solar in a future post. Stay tuned.
-Joe Boyce


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Scott's Contracting