On September 17, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announced the Green Power Leadership Award winners for 2024, honoring four leading organizations in EPA’s Green Power Partnership: Microsoft Corporation, MilliporeSigma, Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens and Signature Aviation.

The 2024 winners go above and beyond simply procuring green power. Actions by these winners push boundaries in the green power market and demonstrate projects that can be replicated by a range of organizations across the economy.

They exemplify the partnership’s goals of driving innovative procurement strategies, enabling green power access and accelerating the transition to a pollution-free electricity sector.

“The 2024 Green Power Leadership Award winners have made outstanding strides in helping to encourage clean, renewable electricity in this country,” said Paul Gunning, Director of the Office of Atmospheric Protection. “Each year, we see increasingly impactful and sophisticated strategies from these leaders. EPA commends their commitment to powering their operations while curbing their emissions, protecting public health and the environment, and growing the green power market.”

Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens, located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is being recognized for its 100% on- and off-site green power procurement strategy, innovative educational initiatives, and significant electrification efforts matched with green power.

Phipps Conservatory produces power on its campus through solar photovoltaic arrays and a wind turbine.

The garden also matches its ambitious electrification initiatives with 100% green power procurement, with three new all-electric buildings and ongoing electrification initiatives for existing buildings and outdoor equipment.

In addition to regularly educating its nearly 500,000 annual visitors about green power, it hosts an annual “Making the Switch at Phipps” program where energy providers inform visitors about their green power options, offering free annual memberships to those who choose 100% green power in their homes.

Phipps also established The Climate Toolkit, enabling 184 participant institutions serving over 86 million annual visitors to access resources related to energy efficiency and green energy for their own institutions.

Visit the Phipps Center for Sustainable Landscapes webpage for more information.

For more than 20 years, the Green Power Leadership Awards have recognized hundreds of organizations for their exceptional achievements and leadership in the green power marketplace.

This year's Green Power Leadership Award recipients are using nearly 14 billion kilowatt-hours of green power annually, enough to power approximately 1.3 million average American homes for a year.

The 2024 Green Power Leadership Award winners stand out through their green power engagement within their respective spheres of influence, deploying strategies such as maximizing onsite wind and solar generation, creating toolkits to engage peers and suppliers in the green power market, and pioneering power purchase agreement models to deliver carbon-free power along with equity benefits.

Green power is electricity generated from renewable resources, such as wind, solar, geothermal, biogas, eligible biomass, and low-impact hydro. These high-quality renewable sources produce green power with little to zero air emissions, or impact on the environment or human health.

EPA’s Green Power Partners drive demand for investment in renewable energy in the U.S. green power market and influence suppliers to switch to green power, accelerating development of these resources and leading the way to a clean energy future.

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[Posted: September 17, 2024]

9/23/2024