Month: March 2023

MEMPHIS, Tenn., March 22, 2023 /3BL Media/ – Today is the , a day to recognize water’s vital role in supporting economic, social and human development. We demonstrate our commitment to water stewardship by improving our operations and engaging our communities to address water-related issues.

Water is essential in almost every step of our product making process, and so, we work to return more than 90 percent of the water we use in operations back to the environment after treatment. This year’s World Water Day theme is accelerating change.

As we look toward 2030 and beyond, we seek to accelerate change by improving the long-term sustainability of water resources where we live and work. Our Springfield, Ore. Containerboard Mill is working to do just that and reduced their mill water consumption by 7.5% in 2022, surpassing their planned reduction, as part of their Water Wise target, of 4%.

The Springfield mill planned and implemented many non-capital projects to aide in their 7.5% water reduction, and incorporated daily discussions of the mill’s river water intake levels against the daily target, investigating any abnormalities in water usage, and troubleshooting if levels are high.

By giving water usage increased visibility, Springfield is able to control its consumption and aim to exceed its water reduction goals each year working towards the company’s Vision 2030 water reduction target of 25%. Springfield plans for more water reduction projects to be executed in 2023.

About International Paper 
International Paper (NYSE: IP) is a global producer of planet-friendly packaging, pulp and other fiber-based products, and one of North America’s largest recyclers. Headquartered in Memphis, Tenn., we employ approximately 39,000 colleagues globally who are committed to creating what’s next. We serve customers worldwide, with manufacturing operations in North America, Latin America, North Africa and Europe. Net sales for 2022 were $21.2 billion. Additional information can be found by visiting InternationalPaper.com.

IBM is now accepting proposals for the next cohort of the IBM Sustainability Accelerator, which will focus on water management solutions. This program applies IBM technologies, such as hybrid cloud and artificial intelligence, and an ecosystem of experts to enhance and scale projects focused on populations vulnerable to environmental threats.

According to the World Health Organization, over 2 billion people live in water-stressed countries. This challenge is expected to be exacerbated in some regions as result of climate change and population growth.

In alignment with United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 6, IBM will look to support projects that help improve equitable access to safe drinking water for all, improve water quality by reducing pollution, increase water-use efficiency across all sectors, protect and restore water-related ecosystems, increase sanitation management, and reduce the number of people suffering from water scarcity – among other purposes.

The RFP process will include input from IBM across disciplines, and from representatives from organizations such as Water.org and the United Nations Development Programme. The selection criteria will consider the applicant’s capacity and readiness to support communities who are especially vulnerable to water-related threats, technical feasibility and sustainability for the envisioned solution, and transparency on measurement and reporting – along with others.

“Water management for the world’s most vulnerable communities is a tremendous challenge,” said IBM VP and Chief Impact Officer Justina Nixon-Saintil. “Following our first two cohorts on sustainable agriculture and clean energy, now we look forward to working with organizations with initiatives that scale technology solutions that will support communities in overcoming water challenges, including shortages, pollution, or conservation.”

Non-profit and government initiatives focused on water management can apply to the RFP until the end of May 2023. The selected participants will be announced in November 2023.

Originally published on Built From Scratch

Running our stores more efficiently furthers both our business and sustainability goals. In 2021, we hit key milestones, including a 50% decrease in U.S. store electricity use since 2010.

When we launched our store electricity conservation efforts a few years ago, we anticipated reducing U.S. store electricity use 20% over a decade. But by tapping into technologies and closely tracking and analyzing use, we were able to save more electricity than we originally imagined. (See chart.) In 2021 alone, we reduced year-over-year U.S. store electricity use approximately 11%.

We learned a great deal from the progress we made reducing electricity use in our stores, and now we are applying our experience and proven strategies to conserving resources in other areas of our business, including electricity use in our supply chain and water use in store irrigation.

Our successful energy conservation efforts have helped us move closer to our goal of producing or procuring 100% renewable electricity equivalent to the electricity needs for all Home Depot facilities worldwide by 2030.

LEDs Help Reduce Store Electricity Usage 

In 2021, we completed our multi-year project to upgrade U.S. stores to overhead LED lighting, retrofitting 383 stores in 2021 alone. Now LEDs light up nearly all our store aisles across the U.S., Canada and Mexico. In the U.S., we have invested approximately $230 million in total capital expenditures on LED upgrades since 2018. Our U.S. stores with LEDs consume about 30% less electricity than similar stores with conventional lighting.

Capitalizing on Solar’s Evolution 

Harnessing power from the sun is essential to our renewable electricity aims, and we’re making progress by buying electricity from large-scale commercial solar farms. In 2021, Enel Green Power’s Azure Sky began operating in Haskell County, Texas, west of Dallas, providing us with 75-megawatts of renewable electricity. We have agreed to purchase another 150 megawatts from companies building solar farms elsewhere in Texas. Once operating, we expect these commercial solar farms, in addition to our wind farm projects, to provide us with enough electricity to power the equivalent of more than 500 Home Depot stores.

Rooftop Solar Harvests Renewable Energy

Seeing the potential to use soccer-field-size space atop our stores to harvest the sun’s power, we installed our first rooftop solar farm in 2014. By the end of 2021, solar farms operated on 76 Home Depot stores and one distribution center in the U.S. In 2022, we’re increasing our emphasis on rooftop solar by:

Increasing the amount of roof space allocated to solar panels at our storesExploring possibilities for adding solar panels atop more distribution facilities

Water Use Drops with Smart Irrigation

A pilot program launched in 2019 showed us the potential of using smart irrigation systems to save water at our stores. We rolled out the technology to 164 additional stores in 2021; 503 U.S. stores were using smart irrigation systems by the end of the year. On average, there is a 29% reduction in water used to irrigate landscaping, compared to stores with traditional timer-based irrigation systems.

Here’s how it works: In-ground sensors, real-time weather data and other data sources guide when sprinklers come on and how long they operate. So, a store’s landscaped areas are watered according to plants’ needs, rather than the clock.

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