This week Eclipse Awards became Bullfrog Powered! This commits us to our 5th year of being green powered (our first 4 years were with BC Hydro’s Green Power Certificates program). Using green power is one part of Eclipse’s commitment to reducing our environmental footprint, being carbon neutral, building the community we believe in, and providing leadership to other small businesses.
So what does using green power mean? In this case, being bullfrog-powered means that for all of the electricity used by Eclipse Awards, bullfrog contributes an equal amount of electricity into the BC grid from renewable energy projects located in BC and Alberta. Bullfrog's current mix in BC is approximately 80% from certified low-impact hydro, and 20% from wind energy sources. All projects are verified under a 3rd party, EcoLogo, to ensure accuracy.
Without a doubt, conservation and simply using as little electricity as possible is the best and fastest way to lower your energy footprint. Some people call these negawatts - they are the least expensive tool at our disposal and the one we should use first. As with design, the elegance of conservation lies in what you don't use. We designed our new office to embrace natural light and in fact, we rarely even turn on the lights between April and September. When we do use electricity though, we want that power to be produced as cleanly and as locally as possible. By working with a partner like bullfrogPower, we help to create more demand for green power projects in BC.
Choosing green power is definitely affordable and something most organizations should consider, especially when you think about these benefits:
Sustainability has a lot of dimensions and power and energy are definitely big considerations. Using green power to lighten our footprint, differentiate our company, and help enable new renewable power projects is a perfect example of the win-win-win situations we like to create at Eclipse Awards. Working with an excellent partner like bullfrog is also enjoyable and rewarding.