GM has met the standards of the EPA’s Energy Star Challenge for Industry at 30 North American facilities, reducing energy intensity on an average of 25 percent, and avoiding more than 778,000 metric tons of greenhouse gas emission, the company said.
To meet the program’s goals, GM said that it benchmarked energy use through energy management systems, automated the shut-down of equipment, and made upgrades to lighting and heating and cooling systems.
The efforts saved GM $50 million in energy costs, the company said.
The ENERGY STAR Challenge is a national call-to-action to improve the energy efficiency of commercial and industrial buildings. The Challenge for Industry recognizes industrial sites that improve their energy efficiency by 10 percent within five years, and offers a blueprint for the first steps a site can take toward meeting energy efficeiency goals.
GM said that its 30 plants represent nearly a third of the manufacturing sites that have met the program targets – so far, 86 of the 386 manufacturing sites enlisted in the EPA that have taken the challenge have improved their energy efficiency by 10 percent or more.