We Did It … We’re No. 1!

Release Date: Wednesday, September 28th 2011

Kudos to DC, recognized recently as the top, and first, US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Green Power Community Challenge winner—for purchasing more green power annually than any other city! Local businesses, residents, and the DC government collectively purchased more than 772 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power, enough to meet more than 8% of the community’s total electricity use. And, to think, the effort was all voluntary and came after Mayor Vincent Gray challenged DC businesses and residents to work together to boost the city’s overall green power purchases.

	Check out our Downtown ecoDistrict Leadership Paper DowntownDC ecoDistrict: A 21st Century Sustainability Framework

Richard H. Bradley, executive director of the DowntownDC BID, a major Challenge partner, also encouraged the businesses and buildings in the DowntownDC ecoDistrict to support this DC effort to become one of the world’s most sustainable cities. Last spring, the BID switched its own SAM headquarters building, located at 1229 New York Avenue and home to its Safety/Hospitality and Maintenance employees, to 100% wind power to reduce costs and dependency on carbon-based fuels that harm the environment. For a list of Downtown and DC businesses that registered as partners with EPA, click here.

Throughout the Challenge, participating DC businesses, residents, and the local government committed to buy green power produced from a subset of renewable energy resources—wind, solar, geothermal, biogas, biomass, and low-impact hydropower—in amounts that met or exceeded EPA's purchase requirements. In the end, more than 30 communities in 14 states and DC used 3.3 billion kWh of green power annually, surpassing the more than 1.8 billion kWh goal.

The year-long Green Power Community Challenge began in September 2010 and concluded on September 20 with DC and Brookeville, Maryland, named as winners—the latter for the highest green power percentage of total electricity use. But the Challenge really isn’t over. Year two of the challenge has already begun and will end September 2012. The city and the BID are encouraging local businesses and residents to continue to go green. It’s not too late!

Green Power Communities are members of EPA’s Green Power Partnership, a program working with more than 1,300 partner organizations to voluntarily purchase green power to reduce the environmental impacts of conventional electricity use. For more information about the District Green Power Challenge, visit www.green.dc.gov and click on “buy green power.”