• Bold Eco Moves: Kaiser Permanente, Kimpton Hotels
• Notable: Accenture, Cargill, Citigroup, Crown Equipment, Detroit Edison, FedEx, First Wind, Ford/Microsoft, Hormel, Intel, Renault, Trader Joe’s, Wells Fargo
• ROI Success Stories: Arcelor Mittal, Ford, RSC Equipment
• Government and Legal: EPA new water guidelines, New fuel standards, EPA’s pollution enforcement delay, offshore drilling, BPA, federal hybrid fleet, Shell settlement, Entergy ruling
  
• Tech Innovations: Lower-emission asphalt
• Economic Indicators & Trends: Clean tech VC totals, global solar capacity
• NGO News: Greenpeace targets Koch Industries, issues report on Green IT
• New Research & Tools: Walmart sustainability assessment webinar, consumer green living report

BOLD ECO MOVES

Kaiser Permanente announced the launch of a 15-megawatt solar project across fifteen California locations to be completed by 2011. The installations will provide 10 percent of the power to the Kaiser sites that host them and prevent annual emissions of 15,890 metric tons of CO2.
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Kimpton Hotels will pursue Green Seal certification for all of its 50 upscale hotel properties, making it the first boutique hotelier in the U.S. to pursue green certification for all of its properties. A total of 27 of their hotels have already received the third-party environmental certification.
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NOTABLE

Accenture pledged to reduce its 2012 per-capita carbon footprint by 40 percent from 2007 levels.
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Cargill is converting manure from 6,000 cattle on an Idaho dairy farm into a million kilowatt hours of electricity, which it is selling back to the grid. The company also plans to sell emission offsets from the project.
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Citigroup was named “America’s Greenest Bank” in a new ranking from Bank Technology News, which ranks financial institutions according to the sustainability of their technology and operations.
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Forklift manufacturer Crown Equipment reached zero landfill status at an Ohio facility by recycling 96 percent of waste and converting the remainder to energy. It has also adopted water-based paints and non-solvent based cleaning solutions to reduce air pollution.
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Detroit Edison will invest $100 million in its SolarCurrents program, which aims to incent businesses to add solar power systems to their rooftops and generate 15 megawatts of energy over the next five years.
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FedEx plans to be the first U.S. delivery service to use an all-electric truck when it adds four Navistar vehicles to its Los Angeles fleet in June.
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First Wind received a conditional commitment for a $117 million loan guarantee from the US Department of Energy to finance a 30 MW wind project in Kahuku, Hawaii. The project will power 7,700 homes each year.
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Ford will integrate Microsoft’s Hohm smart meter technology into its Focus Electric model next year, which will tell drivers when it is cheapest to recharge their vehicles.
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Hormel Foods’ new plant in Iowa will use 25 percent less water and energy than the typical plant. If approved, it will also be the only refrigerated food processing facility to be LEED-certified.
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Intel will amend its corporate charter to include “corporate social responsibility and sustainability” as part of its overall policy responsibility, acknowledging directors’ fiduciary duty to assess long and short term sustainability trends and impacts on the business.
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Renault’s electric car TV advertisement was banned in Britain because it implied that there would be zero emissions associated with the entire lifecycle of the car.
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Trader Joe’s said it would purchase all of its seafood from sustainable sources by the end of 2012 after a Greenpeace campaign targeted the retailer for its seafood procurement practices.
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Wells Fargo & Company said its “green” financing totaled more than $6 billion in 2009, a six-fold increase since it began the financing in 2005. Green building and renewable energy projects accounted for the majority of investments, with 52 percent and 30 percent of the total, respectively.
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ROI SUCCESS STORIES

ArcelorMittal’s specialty rolling mill plant in Pennsylvania has saved $200,000 in annual energy bills through efficiency improvements including automated systems that idle electrical machinery during production delays.
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Ford deployed a PC power-management program, which is expected to save $1.2 million per year by centralizing power settings for the company’s desktops and laptops. Ford found that over 60 percent of employees fail to turn off their computers at night and on the weekends.
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RSC Equipment Rental leveraged an equipment refurbishing program and a tire pressure equalizing system to realize $26 million in savings during 2009.
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GOVERNMENT AND LEGAL

EPA issued tough new water quality guidelines that are expected to sharply limit the coal-mining practice of mountaintop removal.
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The US federal government issued a fuel economy standard for new autos and light trucks of 35.5 MPG by 2016—a rule that should cut carbon emissions by 30 percent from 2012 to 2016. After thirty years of debate, this new standard is estimated to increase the purchase price of an average 2016 car by $1,000 but decrease the associated fuel expenses by $3,000 over the life of the car.
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The EPA officially confirmed that it will not require pollution permits for major greenhouse gas emitters, such as utilities and industrial plants, until January 2011. However, it has not yet confirmed the threshold of emissions required for permits.
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An Obama administration proposal introduced last week would open areas of the Atlantic, Gulf and Alaskan coastlines to offshore oil and gas drilling. The coastline from NJ northward and the Pacific Coast, from Mexico to Canada, would remain closed.
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The EPA added bisphenol A (BPA) to its “chemicals of concern” list, which requires manufacturers to report data on the substance’s long-term health and environmental impacts and conduct research into substitutes. BPA is found in some hard plastic bottles, can liners, receipt papers, CDs and other items.
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The U.S. will double the federal government’s hybrid fleet by purchasing over 5,000 hybrid vehicles this year.
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As part of two Clean Air Act Settlements, Shell Chemical and Shell Chemical Yabucoa will pay a $3.3 million civil penalty to the U.S., Alabama and Louisiana and will install about $6 million in pollution reduction equipment on two oil refining facilities.
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New York State ruled that Entergy's 1970s-era "once-through" cooling systems for its Indian Point nuclear plant violates the Clean Water Act because they kill too many fish and consume and contaminate too much water. The NY Department of Environmental Conservation argued that Entergy must convert to a "closed-cycle" cooling system, which consumes 90% less water and reduces ecosystem impacts.
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TECH INNOVATIONS

The Carbon Trust is partnering with U.K. asphalt companies to fund a variety of semi-warm and cold mix asphalt research projects that would trim the asphalt industry’s current U.K. emission levels by 39 percent by 2020.
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ECONOMIC INDICATORS & TRENDS

Clean tech venture investments totaled $1.9 billion during the first quarter, a 29 percent jump over fourth quarter 2009. A record-breaking 180 deals were signed.
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Global installed solar power capacity grew by 6.4 gigawatts to 20 gigawatts in 2009, and should grow 15 percent more during 2010.
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NGO NEWS

Greenpeace published a report denouncing Koch Industries’ funding of research and public relations efforts to undermine climate change science. Separately, it released a “Make IT Green” report that predicts greenhouse gases associated with cloud computing functions will triple by 2020.
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CEF MEMBERS ONLY

• Request a copy of a special CEF Briefing Memo on ARPA-E funding opportunities.
• A draft of the 2010 Annual Meeting Agenda is now available.  Please request a copy then send us your feedback.

NEW RESEARCH AND TOOLS

Walmart produced a free Webinar to help suppliers understand the Walmart Supplier Sustainability Assessment, featuring presentations from the Alliance to Save Energy, Carbon Disclosure Project, Conservation International, Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, Rainforest Alliance, and Walmart.
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Mintel’s latest report on green living found that over one-third (35%) of survey respondents would pay more for ‘environmentally friendly’ products.
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