EPA recognizes FA among nation's leading green power users

Ranks No. 11 on EPA's Top 30 K-12 Schools list.

Friends Academy has appeared for the first time on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Top 30 K-12 Schools list of the largest green power users, when it was ranked at No. 11.

Friends is using over 2 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power annually, which is enough green power to meet 100 percent of the organization's electricity use. Friends Academy is buying renewable energy certificates (RECs) from Sterling Planet, which supports cleaner renewable energy alternatives.

This green power commitment also qualifies Friends Academy for EPA's Green Power Leadership Club, a distinction given to organizations that have significantly exceeded EPA's minimum requirements. Green Power Leadership Club members must use ten times the Partnership's minimum green power use requirement organization-wide.

Green power is electricity that is generated from environmentally preferable renewable resources, such as wind, solar, geothermal, biogas, eligible biomass, and low-impact hydro. Using green power helps accelerate the development of new renewable energy capacity nationwide and helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the power sector.

According to the U.S. EPA, Friends Academy's green power use of over 2 million kWh is equivalent to avoiding the carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions of more than 300 passenger vehicles per year, or the CO₂ emissions from the electricity use of more than 200 average American homes annually.

The Green Power Partnership is a voluntary program that encourages organizations to use green power as a way to reduce the environmental impacts associated with electricity use. The Partnership currently has more than 1,300 Partner organizations voluntarily using billions of kilowatt-hours of green power annually. Partners include a wide variety of leading organizations such as Fortune 500^® companies; small and medium sized businesses; local, state, and federal governments; and colleges and universities. For additional information, please visit http://www.epa.gov/greenpower.