Sustainability

Through our partnership with Restore the Earth Foundation that is restoring forest and wetland ecosystems on a landscape-scale in a way that has the greatest impact for business, the environment, and communities, we are helping contribute to the economic recovery in the Mississippi Valley.

We supported the Utah Food Services and their food rescue efforts, who in the past two years have rescued and donated over 75,000 leftover event meals to the Salt Lake community. In addition, any food scraps were sent to Wasatch Resource Recovery anaerobic digester, that turns food waste into a responsibly-sourced natural gas. At the end of the event, we were able to recover uneaten food and donated 527 pounds of food to the local community. This is the equivalent of 439 meals.

We provided trainings for attendees that would enhance their business practices to ensure healthy and safe workplaces for their employees. Solar health and safety concerns include fire safety, workforce development, and codes & standards. The solar industry is working proactively in these areas by pursuing industry-wide solutions that ensure responsible business practices among U.S. solar companies. Additionally, we held a 5k at our event as a way to get attendees energized and moving early in the morning to kick off the conference.

We value diversity, inclusion, and equity within our organizations and promote these values across the industry. From our Commitment to Collaboration to our strict show floor and education policies, our event addresses the imbalances in our industry. Many of our diversity and inclusion initiatives were showcased in our community engagement lounge, alongside our annual Women in Solar and Storage luncheon where attendees heard from a trailblazer, Dr. Jen Welter, the NFL’s first female coach as she discussed the importance of changing the field by embracing authentic leadership from within and emphasizing the need to create a diverse workforce.

The Show utilized bulk water dispensers and the Salt Palace water filling stations to reduce water and plastic waste. 

By convening the largest solar and energy storage tradeshow in the country, we brought together the industry and held sessions that discussed financing methods and ways to make clean energy affordable and accessible to all. Several of our industry partners, such as Clean Coalition, Energy Trust of Oregon, GRID Alternatives, IREC, Power52, Renewable Northwest, the Solar Foundation, Vote Solar and others are committed to making clean energy affordable and accessible to all.

Through our workshops and installer training theater, we offered trainings and education on how to promote a sustained and inclusive business that offers productive employment and work experiences for employees. Our industry partners, Power52 and the Solar Foundation, are committed to promoting a sustainable and inclusive work force and offered their insights through sessions offered at the conference. Additionally,  our job fair served as a platform for employers to connect with those seeking opportunities within the industry.

We showcased many new startup companies and provided the platform for innovative new technologies to find markets in the growing industry. By promoting clean tech innovation, we can work towards solving the big global challenges we face.

We partnered with the organization Get Charged Up that does a lot of work in emerging markets as well as work with immigration; they spoke in the community engagement lounge. Additionally, through our International Buyers Program, we provided content to attendees on addressing inequality within global financial markets.

Through our partnership with Restore the Earth Foundation, we assisted in the restoration of a historic bald cypress forest that not only sequesters carbon from the atmosphere, but will help protect coastal communities through providing green infrastructure solutions to build asset infrastructure resilience. Through our focus on smart cities, we are looking at how we’re powering smart cities to make them more sustainable and renewable and we will expand on this education programming at our events to provide tangible resources for attendees. We are working on a carbon-free future. We actively facilitate the electric power industry’s smart transition to a clean and modern energy future through education, research, standards, and collaboration. We are constantly seeking out new partnerships, technologies, and business opportunities to help you succeed! Through our transportation electrification focus, we are providing valuable educational content on how to make cities more inclusive, safe, resilient, and sustainable. Part of the conversation includes electrification of public transportation fleets. Sustainable and resilient buildings are part of the conversations we have at our conference and include leaders in the space to provide this content to our attendees.

Several of our education programming spoke about responsible consumption of solar panels including the importance of recycling PV panels as well as the life cycle of batteries. As event organizers, we looked at how we can be responsible event organizers to limit our environmental impact. We made an effort to ensure exhibitors participated in our donation program and we successfully donated 118,066 pounds of donated materials, which is truly record breaking for our event and for Salt Palace Convention Center. We made sure to recycle as much as possible and the plastic signs that are not recyclable were donated to local organizations that are able to upcycle the materials.

Solar energy is a renewable, carbon-free resource available in every geographic region of the U.S. We represent the industry that is growing renewable energy sources to power a clean, affordable economic future. Our events are powered by solar power either through on-site solar generation or through Solar Renewable Energy Credits (SRECs), which we acquire to match our electricity consumption on site. Using Solar Renewable Energy Credits from the Salt Palace rooftop solar array, the Show has acquired enough credits to offset its energy footprint (145 metric tons). This is equivalent to 353,356 miles not driven in a car or 2,390 trees planted and grown for ten years (source: EPA Greenhouse Gas Calculator). We integrate climate change into the conversation to build awareness on the importance of clean energy in helping address the climate crisis. Additionally, through our partnership with Restore the Earth foundation, we will assist with removal of 2,505 metric tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.

We made a concerted effort to recycle as many materials as possible. This included shrink wrap, visqueen, plastic bags included in packaging, and any sort of stretch plastic. In total, we collected 3,900 tons of plastic film, which usually ends up in the trash and often ends up in the ocean.  In partnership with Observe & Serve, show attendees had the opportunity to upcycle plastic into sleeping pads and pillows, which were distributed to those in need. Potential homes for the pads included refugee camps, Native American tribes, and homeless populations. Vinyl banners are often not recyclable, so we donated all our vinyl banners to a local organization, Global Artisans, that will upcycle the signs and turn them into totes. The project we will help fund through our Restore the Earth Foundation, we will assist in the restoring marine life in the Gulf of Mexico.

Power Plaza, our Annual Block Party, Ener-chella, remind us to get outside and take advantage of our world. In all that we do, we strive to strike a balance between environmental, human, and economic development needs in order to create a more resilient industry and show. The Show, our Partners, and the Salt Palace aimed to eliminate any show - related soil and water contamination by responsible materials sourcing and strong recycling efforts. We gave attendees the opportunity to pay $5 to offset their carbon and collected a total of $12,525. This money was donated to Restore the Earth Foundation, which will go towards restoring 4,000 acres of a historic bald cypress forest at Pointe-aux-Chenes Wildlife Management Area in Louisiana.

To reduce inequalities, policies should be universal in principle, paying attention to the needs of disadvantaged and marginalized populations. We continuously build a broad coalition of partners who share our vision of a better future.