Wal-Mart Goes Green: The World’s First Quintuple Play

Watching baseball’s first quadruple play was strange. Seeing Wal-Mart go green is stranger still.


First the baseball: The scene was a game of T-Ball, where everyone bats every inning, regardless of the number of outs.

The bases were loaded when a line drive ended up in the glove of the pitcher. While he wondered how it got there, all the runners took off without tagging up. The pitcher ran to third, then second, then first.

We kept counting the number of outs and they did not add up. First in our heads: That doesn’t make sense. Then on our hand: That’s crazy. Then our other hand: It kept adding up to four outs. It took us a while to believe what we saw right in front of us.

And now Wal-Mart, the original Black Hat, is going green. Or better said, sustainable. Let that sink in because it is true. Big time.

So much so that Treehugger.com says It “could end up being one of the biggest motivators to make truly ‘green’ products ever.”

As in history of the world.
Wal-Mart has made believers out of not just the biggest environmental organizations in the world — like the Environmental Defense Fund and the World Wildlife Federation — but also Wal-Mart’s suppliers.

It started five years ago when Wal-Mart announced three goals: 1) 100 percent renewable energy; 2) Zero waste; 3) Sustainable products.

Wal-Mart stores have already gone sustainable on dozens of fronts from shipping to selling to storing to recycling. Last year, Wal-Mart saved 4.8 billion plastic shopping bags. That’s how they roll in Bentonville: Big.

Even the combined efforts of 8400 stores with two million associates doing $400 billion in sales every year was not enough: Wal-Mart figured out 90 percent of the carbon was coming from its supply chain. So it reached down to all its 100,000 vendors — and their vendors and their vendors — and told them that reducing carbon footprints — reducing energy — will save money.

Everyone knows that is what Wal-Mart is all about.

“And vendors are listening,” said Tom Rooney, CEO of SPG Solar in Novato, California, one of the largest solar installers in the country. “We are seeing renewed and intense interest in industrial- and commercial-scale solar because of Wal-Mart and Proctor and Gamble and other companies are showing their suppliers how to change their shipping, packaging, storing, selling, heating, cooling, disposing, recycling and other practices to squeeze energy out of the supply chain and save money. And solar is a big part of that.”

Not that many need much coaxing: Financial incentives for solar today are so strong that many companies are essentially getting free energy — and more — by buying a new solar array from the money they will save from lower energy bills. And having a big chunk left over.

Now on top of that, the largest companies in the world are saying solar and other renewables have to be a part of their supply chain. By some estimates, 1 in 3 dollars worldwide is associated with a company that does business with Walmart. So, if you shift Walmart and its suppliers, the global economy shifts with it, says R. Paul Herman at hipinvestor.com. Or as the New York Times puts it: “because of its size and power, Wal-Mart usually gets what it wants.” And Wal-Mart wants renewable energy.

Earlier this year, Wal-Mart sent its vendors a 15 part questionnaire to determine what their companies were doing to become more sustainable. Also leading the effort is Wal-Mart’s “Sustainabilty Index.”

Scholars from around the world are gathering at the Universities of Arizona and Arkansas to create this new measure of the energy created — and wasted — during the life cycle of a product found at Wal-Mart. It won’t be ready for at least another year.

“But that doesn’t matter,” says Rooney. “No one is fighting Wal-Mart or complaining about the reporting that this new index requires. Just the opposite: They are racing to out do each other, and surpass Wal-Mart’s expectations. Right now. Not next year.”

And why not:
In May, the world’s largest consumer product company, Proctor and Gamble, announced its own, similar, sustainability program for its vendors. Joining IBM, GE, and other corporate giants on the sustainability train.

The results are already showing up on the bottom line:

“Perhaps more than any other company, Wal-Mart has pursued this approach” said the Harvard Business Review of Wal-Mart’s new vision of sustainability. “The payoffs are already showing up: One of the Sustainable Value Networks, tasked with fleet logistics, came up with a transportation strategy that improved efficiency by 38%, saving Wal-Mart more than $200 million annually and cutting its greenhouse gas emissions by 200,000 tons per year.”

Wal-Mart: Not just for beating up anymore. Or maybe we are just seeing the world’s first quintuple play.

Article by Jim Fitzpatrick, a retired civil engineer and solar enthusiast.

EPA wants half of state’s trash kept out of landfills

The Ohio EPA wants to boost recycling rates across the state without creating additional financial demands for cash-strapped waste management districts, including the Solid Waste Authority of Central Ohio, which is working to erase a projected $6 million budget shortfall this year.

SWACO and the other 51 solid waste districts in the state must figure out how to comply with EPA regulatory guidelines that call for boosting the state’s recycling rate to 50 percent from 40.7 percent in 2007, the last year data were available. The agency’s plan is focused on improving the effectiveness of community recycling programs, officials said.

The goals include requiring districts to get better at changing recycling behavior in their communities through marketing and outreach efforts, and developing resources such as Web sites and guides listing local recycling opportunities. The plan also sets a new goal for solid waste districts to measure the effects of their recycling and waste reduction programs on greenhouse gas emissions. There also will be a stepped-up focus on the development of technology to convert waste to energy sources such as electricity and vehicle fuels.

“It’s not optional,” said Andrew Booker, a supervisor in Ohio EPA’s Division of Solid and Infectious Waste Management. “Their plans will have to demonstrate how they will meet these goals.”

The good news, Booker said, is many of the solid waste districts already meet or exceed the recycling goals in the new statewide plan. Those that don’t may be able to get there by improving the effectiveness of their recycling programs, rather than raising landfill fees and other levies to fund their compliance efforts.

SWACO Executive Director Ron Mills said the Columbus-area district has taken steps that will go a long way toward meeting or surpassing the goals. “The recommendations in that report in and of themselves will not drive up our operating costs,” he said.

SWACO has had to make a number of moves to eliminate this year’s $6 million budget shortfall, including requiring local trash haulers to dump at SWACO’s landfill in southern Franklin County instead of at private out-of-county sites, eliminating some programs, reducing staff and streamlining business operations.

Ohio EPA recognizes these are tough economic times for solid waste districts since they are financially dependent on landfill fees, Booker said. Revenue from such “tipping” fees are closely tied to economic conditions, with drops in manufacturing and fewer purchases by consumers in a recession lowering the amount of trash headed to landfills.

“Despite the financial challenges, we’ve seen positive movement on recycling from residents and businesses,” he said. “There is continuing interest by folks to do more recycling.” EPA reported that nearly 13 million tons of waste was reduced or recycled statewide in 2007.

The recycling rate in SWACO’s district – comprising Franklin and small parts of Union, Delaware, Fairfield, Licking and Pickaway counties – is nearly 30 percent, Mills said. That includes activity at the district’s 220 drop-box locations, where recycling was up 16 percent in 2009 compared with the prior year, according to SWACO.

But there appears to be plenty of work still to be done. In his State of the City address in February, Columbus Mayor Mike Coleman said the city has one of the worst recycling rates among big cities. Columbus residents recycle just 14.6 percent of their trash, according to rankings from Akron-based trade journal Waste & Recycling News.

To address that, the city will reinstate weekly yard waste collections in April, Coleman said, and he will push for a free curb-side recycling program for residents by 2012. “We plan to work with the city as they roll that out,” Mills said, noting SWACO’s drop boxes can complement Columbus’ curb-side program.

Waste to energy: As for another aspect of EPA’s new recycling plan, Mills said SWACO is ahead of the curve on converting landfill gas to energy and green fuels. SWACO has a Green Energy Center that takes methane from the landfill and converts it to compressed natural gas to power some of the district’s vehicles.

In addition, Cleveland-based Quasar Energy Group is working with Kurtz Brothers Inc. of Independence to develop a facility at the former Columbus trash-burning power plant that will divert organic waste from landfills and convert it to electricity or green fuels.

Mills said similar waste-to-energy projects have the potential to become revenue producers for SWACO.

“We’re looking at ways to adjust and enhance some of resources beyond a costly (trash) rate increase,” he said. “That’s not the answer.”

AWESOME Video on How to Stop the Gulf Oil Spil

Giant wind turbine blade tours America’s heartland

Energy company GE has kicked off a 28-day tour of nine states to raise awareness of renewable energy and urge people to lobby their politicians to support clean energy.

The firm started off yesterday in Aberdeen, South Dakota, offering up one of its 131-foot wind turbine blades as a petition to be signed by the public (pictured right).

It will tour states including Iowa, Illinois, Ohio, Kentucky and Texas before wrapping up in Dallas, Texas, at the American Wind Energy Association’s Windpower 2010 exhibition.

Offshore wind farm could have big impact

For the last decade, the backers of a huge wind power project off the coast of Cape Cod have navigated through stormy community meetings, hidden regulatory snags and verbal cannon blasts from the Kennedy family and a pair of Indian tribes.

Any day now, they will find out whether it was all for naught. The Obama administration, which last week signaled its intention to proceed with other offshore wind projects, is about to decide whether to deep-six the Cape Wind proposal or provide a friendly gale that could carry it to completion.
If approved, the project would most likely be the nation’s first offshore wind farm. And in either case, the ruling by Interior Secretary Ken Salazar would have implications from Long Island to Lake Erie. At least half a dozen offshore wind projects that could provide electricity for hundreds of thousands of customers have already been proposed in the shallow waters off the East Coast and the Great Lakes.
A thumbs-down on Cape Wind, some developers say, could gut America’s offshore wind industry before it ever really gets started. “It is imperative that Cape Wind gets built — we need the momentum,” said Peter Giller, chief executive of OffshoreMW, an upstart developer with ambitions to build two 700-megawatt projects off the shores of New Jersey and Massachusetts.

Although offshore wind farms are roughly twice as expensive as land-based ones, developers and advocates say offshore projects have several advantages. Sea and lake breezes are typically stronger, steadier and more reliable than wind on land. Offshore turbines can also be located close to the power-hungry populations along the coasts, eliminating the need for new overland transmission lines. And if the turbines are built far enough from shore, they do not significantly alter the view — a major objection from many local opponents.
Other nations have embraced offshore wind as a major source of renewable energy. In Europe alone, there are currently 830 offshore wind turbines connected to the power grid in nine countries, according to the European Wind Energy Association

In the United States, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory has estimated that about 90,000 megawatts of electricity could be extracted from offshore winds in coastal waters less than 100 feet deep, the easiest and most cost-effective depths. Most of that potential lies in New England, the mid-Atlantic and the Great Lakes.
If the handful of American projects on the drawing board are built as planned, they would produce some 2,500 megawatts, according to the American Wind Energy Association or about as much as two midsize nuclear power plants.

But despite years of efforts, not a single offshore turbine has been built in the United States. Experts say progress has been slowed by a variety of factors, including poor economics, an uncertain regulatory framework and local opposition.

Wind energy continues to flex its growing power around the world

New wind power installations in the EU last year, which increased 23% over 2008, brought the region’s total capacity to nearly 75 GW. Global wind turbines installations in 2009 were worth about €45 billion.

With its vast population and seemingly limitless thirst to acquire raw resources and additional energy sources for its emerging middle class, China was the world’s biggest wind power market last year, almost doubling its installed wind farm generation capacity to 25 GW.

China’s growth in wind power was so spectacular that it represented one-third of the world’s new wind energy installed capacity in 2009 of 37.5 GW, according to the Global Wind Energy Council (GWEC).

Regardless of the severe global economic downturn caused by the worst recession since the 1930s, China installed 13 GW of new capacity in 2009, GWEC reported, noting the Asian nation’s wind energy industry experienced another year of more than 100% growth.

GWEC also noted that cumulative world-wide wind power capacity installed by the end of 2009 totaled nearly 158 GW – a 31% increase from the year before.

“The continued rapid growth of wind power despite the financial crisis and economic downturn is testament to the inherent attractiveness of the technology, which is clean, reliable and quick to install,” said Steve Sawyer, GWEC’s Secretary General.

“Wind power has become the power technology of choice to a growing number of countries around the world,” Sawyer said, adding wind energy’s continued growth can be attributed to national energy policies and because many governments promoted renewable energy development in their economic recovery plans.

In addition to China, other Asian nations– India, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan – helped make Asia the world’s largest wind power market last year, with more than 14 GW of new capacity.

North America and Europe, each of which installed more than 10 GW of new wind capacity, also helped drive the global wind power success story in 2009.

The US wind energy industry experienced a 39% increase in new installed capacity last year, which brought its total capacity total to 35 GW.

New wind power installations in the EU last year, which increased 23% over 2008, brought the region’s total capacity to nearly 75 GW. Global wind turbines installations in 2009 were worth about €45 billion, GWEC noted, adding about 500,000 people are now employed by the wind industry around the world.

The wind industry will also save about 204 million tonnes of CO2 every year, GWEC reported.

Wind Power in America’s Future: 20% Wind Energy by 2030

In 2006, a collaborative panel explored a modeled energy scenario in which wind would provide 20 percent of our nation’s electricity by 2030. Their official 2008 report estimates impacts and discusses specific needs and outcomes in the areas of technology, manufacturing, transmission and grid integration, markets, siting strategies, and potential environmental effects….