The Green Shop

A couple of companies are in the news because of their efforts to reduce their climate impact through green building measures. IKEA recently released its 2009 sustainability report, announcing that it reduced its total CO2 emissions by 5% in 2009 compared to the previous year. The report also offers details of their “IKEA Goes Renewable” project to reduce the carbon emissions of their buildings and move towards powering all buildings with 100% renewable energy. The report may be downloaded here. They don’t give a timeline for achieving 100% renewable power, but IKEA expects to have solar panels on 30 to 40 buildings by the end of FY2011.

Enterprise Holdings, which operates Alamo Rent a Car, Enterprise Rent-A-Car, National Car Rentals, and Enterprise Fleet Management, announced a new sustainability initiative this week that aims to reduce energy use and costs by 20% by greening their neighborhood car rental branches and airport facilities. Called 20/20 Vision, the energy efficiency program was piloted in select markets in 2009 and was so successful it is now being rolled out globally across all their brands. Enterprise expects to save $50 million in energy costs over the next five years as a result.

-Maggie Santolla

Clothing retailer and manufacturer Levi’s is holding a clever design competition to find innovative new answers to the common clothesline. After conducting a Life Cycle Assessment of their jeans, they found that 60% of climate impact happens after the consumer takes the product home, and 80% of that comes from drying. However, the average US household chooses a dryer appliance over air drying, and apparently some communities find clotheslines (and, I assume, the unmentionables and other items hanging from them) so unsightly that they have banned them altogether. Levi’s contends that with a stylish, sustainable and innovative solution, more households and communities will embrace air drying. As an apartment dweller I would love to see an indoor alternative to an unwieldy drying rack or my current method involving lots of hangers and every available hook and doorknob, but it’s hard to beat the simplicity of a piece of string and some clothespins in terms of a sustainable alternative to the dryer. If a new air drying concept requires a lot of additional material, is it really that green?

This contest is part of Levi’s effort to bring their carbon footprint down to zero and I appreciate the acknowledgment and involvement of the consumer in an organization’s climate impact. Many companies are concentrating external carbon reduction efforts on their supplier base and directing those efforts to the people using your products seems like a logical step for a green economy retailer. It makes sense that Levi’s would concentrate their CSR communications on their iconic product line, but next I’d like more information about what they are doing to align their stores to their carbon neutral goal.

-Maggie Santolla