Corporate Group Reaches 360 Megawatts of Green Power Capacity

December 7, 2005

A group representing a dozen corporate buyers of green power has contracted for a total of 360 megawatts of renewable power capacity, equal to an average U.S. coal plant. World Resources Institute (WRI) announced on December 1st that its Green Power Market Development Group has contracted for 185 megawatts of green power in the past 11 months alone. The 360-megawatt achievement places the group one-third of the way toward its goal of building markets for 1,000 megawatts of new green power in the United States. The group includes Alcoa Inc., The Dow Chemical Company, DuPont, FedEx Kinko's, General Motors Corporation, IBM, Interface, Johnson & Johnson, NatureWorks LLC, Pitney Bowes, Staples, and Starbucks. Among the notable green power purchases: Starbucks is purchasing 150 million kilowatt-hours per year, equivalent to 20 percent of the annual electricity use in its U.S. company stores, and NatureWorks, LLC is buying enough green power to make its biobased polymer, NatureWorks PLA, the first greenhouse gas-neutral polymer. WRI is so pleased, it's launching a similar effort in Europe. See the WRI press release.