Top US firms: Hungry for wind and solar power

Appetite for renewables grows amid controversial D. C. climate politics

Major US corporations such as Wal- Mart Stores Inc and General Motors Co have become some of America’s biggest buyers of renewable energy, driving growth in an industry seen as key to helping the US cut carbon emissions.

Last year, nearly 40 percent of US wind contracts were signed by corporate power users, along with university and military customers, up from just 5 percent in 2013, according to the American Wind Energy Association trade group.

These users also accounted for an unprecedented 10 percent of the market for largescale solar projects in 2016, just two years earlier there were none, figures from research firm GTM Research show.

Costs for solar and wind are plunging thanks to technological advances and increased global production of panels and turbines. Coupled with tax breaks and other incentives, big energy users such as GM are finding renewables to be competitive with, which are of- ten cheaper than conventional sources of electricity.

The automaker has struck deals with two Texas wind farms that will soon provide enough energy to power over a dozen GM facilities, including the US sport utility vehicle assembly plant in Arlington, Texas that produces the Chevrolet Tahoe, Cadillac Escalade and GMC Yukon.

The company is already saving $ 5 million a year worldwide, according to Rob Threlkeld, GM’s global manager of renew- able energy, and has committed to obtaining 100 percent of its power from clean sources by 2050.

“It’s been primarily all driven off economics,” Threlkeld said. “Wind and solar costs are coming down so fast that it made it feasible.”

Growing corporate demand for green energy comes as US President Donald Trump is championing fossil fuels and targeting environmental regulations as “job killers.”

This month, the president announced the US will withdraw from the landmark Paris Agreement, aimed to fight climate change, a move that was condemned by several prominent US executives, including General Electric Co- Chief Executive Jeff Immelt.

Trump’s administration, however, has made no moves to target federal tax incentives for renewable energy projects, thanks mainly to bipartisan support in Congress.