Safeway enters U.S. top league of green companies

Safeway Inc.'s efforts to shrink its carbon "footprint" across the continent have landed the supermarket goliath among the top 25 companies and agencies recognized by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for developing renewable energy sources. The Californian East Bay Business Times reports this today.

With its 21st position on the list of companies or organisations that are acknowledged for using “green” electricity (generated from clean, renewable resources such as solar, wind, geothermal, biogas, biomass and low-impact hydro) the U.S. retail giant is still far away from top performer Whole Foods (ranking second) who is described by the EPA as being 100 per cent green on its energy use. By comparison: Safeway’s 87 million kilowatt-hours that are recognised as being derived from a green source accounts for 2 per cent of Safeway’s total energy use.

Safeway is California’s largest corporate buyer of renewable wind energy. "Green energy costs more up front, there's no question, so there is some uncertainty whether it will or won't pay off, but we feel confident it will," Joe Pettus, Safeway's senior vice president of fuel and energy operations said to the East Bay Business Times. "We were a big supporter of AB 32, the greenhouse gas reduction initiative (that targets a 25 per cent reduction statewide by 2020), because we feel it's the right thing to do." Other green initiatives of Safeway are installing more energy-efficient lighting and equipment in its stores, designing new stores to be far more efficient in energy use than existing ones and increasing its recycling of waste materials.

Click here for the full EPA list.