Juniata Ranks in EPA College & University Challenge

The EPA’s Green Power Partnership recognizes governments, businesses, communities, and colleges for their commitment to supporting green power. Through the program, participating members get recognized for their renewable energy purchases by committing to one or more of the following product options; renewable energy credits (RECs), on-site generation and utility green power products.

Since 2001, this program has continued to attract members from organizations of all sizes and from a wide variety of industries from retail and printing to hospitality, information technology, non-profits and more. The EPA also has in place specific partner initiatives to help drive the participation of particular sectors to reduce the environmental impact of their electricity use. These partner initiatives provide:

• Recognition for organizations in these defined groups
• Increased awareness about green power
• Competition to help promote participation

The competition for colleges and universities for instance, has contributed to the purchase of more than 867 million kilowatt hours of green power or renewable energy. According to the EPA, this is equivalent to the amount of electricity needed to power more than 86,000 average American homes annually.

The way the Colleges and Universities Challenge works is simple. Throughout the 2009-10 academic year, the EPA’s Green Power Partnership recognizes and tracks the commitments made by schools in the collegiate athletic conferences. The partnership will then track and recognize the conference with the highest combined green power purchases as well as the largest purchasers within each participating conference. These winners will be selected when the challenge ends in the spring of 2010.

Juniata College, a Renewable Choice client, is in the Landmark Conference and is currently ranked second with its commitment of over 2.8 million kilowatt hours. Juniata College, in Huntington, PA has been purchasing green power for a couple of years now and along with its multi-year green power commitment the school has also announced a commitment to conservation by setting goals to reduce its overall electricity consumption on campus.

Another client that is playing a leadership role in the college and university sector is Auraria Campus in Denver. Auraria is made up of three schools and has the seventh largest commitment in the country and the largest purchaser of renewable energy credits (RECs) in Colorado. It’s 100 percent commitment is backed by a student-led sustainability initiative that was voted on by the student body.

To learn more about Juniata’s commitment, go to its sustainability page. For more information on the EPA’s challenge, go to its partner initiatives page.

PERSONALLY SPEAKING
Renewable energy purchases have significantly increased since the EPA's Green Power Partnership started back in 2001 when it started with less than 50 partners. Today, there are more than 1,100 participating organizations buying over 16 billion kilowatt hours of electricity annually. ~ Megan

Megan Brown is the Client Relations Manager for Renewable Choice.