EPA recognizes Rowan University as Green Power individual Conference Champion

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has recognized Rowan University as the 2008-2009 Individual Conference Champion for purchasing more green power than any other school in the New Jersey Athletic Conference.  This is the ninth environmental award the Glassboro university has received in the last three years.

Since April 2006, EPA’s Green Power Partnership has tracked and recognized the collegiate athletic conferences with the highest combined green power purchases in the nation. The Individual Conference Champion Award recognizes the school that has made the largest individual purchase of green power within a qualifying conference.

Rowan University beat its conference rivals by purchasing nearly 15 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power, representing 35 percent of the school’s annual electricity usage. Rowan University is buying renewable energy certificates from Community Energy, which helps to reduce the environmental impacts associated with the campus’s purchased electricity use.

EPA estimates that Rowan University’s purchase of nearly 15 million kWh of green power is the equivalent amount of electricity needed to power nearly 1,500 average American homes each year or has the equivalent impact of reducing the CO2 emissions of more than 1,900 passenger cars annually. 

"Each year our college and university Green Power Partners raise the bar for clean, renewable energy use," said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. "By taking action on its campus, Rowan University is helping to move our nation into a clean energy future."

Twenty-two collegiate conferences and 44 schools competed in the 2008-2009 challenge, collectively purchasing more than 1 billion kWh of green power. EPA will extend the College & University Green Power Challenge for a fourth year, to conclude in spring of 2010.  EPA’s Green Power Challenge is open to all U.S. colleges, universities, and conferences. In order to qualify, a collegiate athletic conference must include at least one school that qualifies as a Green Power Partner, and the conference must collectively meet EPA’s minimum conference purchase requirement.

Green power is generated from renewable resources such as solar, wind, geothermal, biogas, biomass and low-impact hydro. Green power is considered cleaner than conventional sources of electricity and has lower CO2 emissions, a greenhouse gas linked to global climate change. Purchases of green power help accelerate the development of new renewable energy capacity nationwide.

About the U.S. EPA’s Green Power Partnership: EPA’s Green Power Partnership encourages organizations to purchase green power as a way to reduce the environmental impacts associated with conventional electricity use.  The Green Power Partnership currently has more than 1,000 Partners voluntarily purchasing billions of kWh of green power annually.  Partners include a wide variety of leading organizations, such as Fortune 500 companies; small- and medium-sized businesses; local, state and federal governments; and trade associations, as well as colleges and universities.  For additional information please visit http://www.epa.gov/greenpower.  For more information about EPA’s College and University Green Power Challenge, visit the Challenge Web site at http://www.epa.gov/grnpower/initiatives/cu_challenge.htm.

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