As a B Corp Bank, we are always looking for new ways to leave a lasting impact on our society and environment. Over the past year, our Facilities Supervisor observed a pressing issue – the majority of our lighting across our footprint was in need of repair. Frequent lighting failures resulted in growing facilities tickets, vendor repairs and operating costs, making it clear that a change was needed.
While cutting costs was a priority, it was also imperative to find a solution that aligned with our core values and goals. In our research we discovered that Efficiency Maine had a program designed to assist Maine businesses in becoming more energy-efficient. Using this program we wanted to accomplish four primary objectives:
- Improve overall lighting functionality
- Improve colleague safety and building security
- Lower operating costs by using less energy and requiring little to no vendor involvement to repair light fixtures
- Lower our carbon footprint – further aligning with our strategy as a Certified B Corp
With the help of Efficiency Maine, we replaced all of our lighting fixtures with LED lights, a change that will save us 106,000 kWh usage hours, the equivalent of $22,446 in annual energy costs. This project represents a win on three fronts for the Bank; lessening our carbon footprint, reducing our costs and supporting Snow’s Electric, a trusted and local, women-owned vendor.
Looking forward to the future, we’re benchmarking electrical usage at each location which puts us in a position to measure the real benefits over the next year. We look forward to sharing the results with you as soon as we can. Overall, this is a tremendous example of the real work the Bank and our Environmental Stewardship Impact Team members are doing to reach a more efficient and sustainable future.
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