Hy-Vee Inc is partnering with the US Environmental Protection Agency’s GreenChill program to reduce refrigerant emissions, help protect the ozone layer, and fight climate change.
Michael Smith, Hy-Vee’s director of real estate and sustainability, said, “From the design and construction of our stores to our energy conservation, waste reduction, and product sourcing efforts, Hy-Vee has adopted a host of Earth-friendly practices that promote the well-being of customers, employees, communities, and the global environment.”
“Hy-Vee is setting an excellent example of environmental leadership among supermarkets by voluntarily reducing the company’s impact on the Earth’s ozone layer and on climate change,” said Keilly Witman, EPA’s GreenChill manager. “We at EPA hope that Hy-Vee’s commitment will spur its competitors to meet Hy-Vee’s standards and take the same challenge.”
By joining GreenChill, Hy-Vee commits to:
•Require that all of its new and remodeled stores use environmentally friendlier refrigerants.
•Reduce the amount of refrigerant they use and eliminate refrigerant leaks.
•Adopt green refrigeration technologies, strategies, and practices.
Launched in 2007, GreenChill now includes 49 partners with close to 5,500 stores throughout the nation. Its supermarket partners’ refrigerant leak rates are about 50% lower than the industry average, the EPA estimates. If every supermarket in the nation reduced its refrigerant emissions to the GreenChill average leak rate, the nation would save the equivalent of 22 metric tons of carbon dioxide every year. This is equivalent to taking more than 4,000,000 passenger vehicles off the road.
Hy-Vee is an employee-owned corporation operating 229 retail stores in eight Midwestern states. In fiscal year 2009, the company posted record sales of $6.4 billion, ranking it among the top 30 supermarket chains and the top 50 private companies in the United States. For more information, visit the company’s website at www.hy-vee.com.
Go to www.epa.gov/greenchill for more information about GreenChill.
