US real estate management company Meridian Group announced this week that it has entered into a contract with energy company Constellation to purchase renewable energy certificates (RECs) for nearly its entire portfolio in the Washington, D.C., area.
The credits acquired will cover nearly all of the group’s electricity demand in 2022, which is estimated to be 114 million kilowatt hours per year. The Meridian Group has purchased RECs for all but two of its buildings, with intentions to purchase more RECs for the remaining two by 2024.
Constellation’s RECs are Green-e Energy-certified and derived from wind or solar energy providers around the United States.
The company is currently working to cut total electricity use throughout its portfolio over the next five years. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the Meridian Group’s efforts are expected to cut greenhouse gas emissions related with its energy use by more than 19,000 metric tonnes per year, the equivalent of emissions from more than 4,100 passenger vehicles driven for a year.
The company’s objective is to continue acquiring renewable energy every year, said
Stacy Lautar, senior vice president and director of property management for the Meridian Group, adding that they work with a variety of consultants and technological partners to discover possibilities to be more energy efficient and thereby reduce our carbon impact.
She added, “Meridian is continually looking for ways to save electricity. We do energy audits on a regular basis to explore methods to cut use and work with our tenants to ensure energy consumption is assessed and lowered whenever possible.
“We’re putting measures into place to monitor and control energy demand, make capital upgrades to more energy-efficient equipment, and educating our tenants on how they can help us drive energy consumption down,” she said.
