REI Forges Ahead with Solar Plan

• 

  Your Email: *

  Your Name: *

  Send To: *

  Enter multiple addresses on separate lines or separate them with commas.

  You are going to email the following: REI Forges Ahead with Solar Plan

  Message Subject: (Your Name) has forwarded a page to you from GreenBiz.com®

  Message Body: (Your Name) thought you would like to see this page from GreenBiz.com®.

  Your Personal Message: *
  
• 
• 
• 

OAKLAND, Calif. -- Outdoor gear and apparel company REI has installed solar arrays on three stores in the San Francisco Bay Area — bringing the firm more than halfway to its goal of outfitting 10 percent of its retail sites with systems to harness power from the sun.

The company, the largest non-financial consumer co-op in the United States, is on track to complete solar panel installations at five other stores — three in Oregon and two more in California — by year's end, said Kevin Hagen, the program manager for Corporate Social Responsibility at REI.

In all, 11 of the company's 105 stores in 27 states are to sport rooftop solar power systems as result of the project this year.

REI's San Francisco Store

And all told, the installations, which amount to more than four acres of solar panels, are expected to generate a total of 1.1 million kilowatt hours of electricity.

The company celebrated the completion of the Bay Area solar installations yesterday with an event at the San Francisco store that included info sessions about the technology and energy efficiency.

The PV installation in San Francisco by the Blue Oak Energy firm was completed in October after similar projects wrapped up at the firm's San Carlos store in September and Santa Rosa store in August. The San Francisco setup is expected to provide 19 percent of the site's annual electricity needs. In San Carlos, the figure is 40 percent; in Santa Rosa, 38 percent.

The firm's progress on its solar and green building plans comes as the persisting economic crisis has driven some companies to pull in their horns on capital investments.