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Prudential goes greener with the installation of solar panels on three office buildings

^{Published on 2010-11-09 13:25:52 - Market Wire}
 

NEWARK, N.J.--([ BUSINESS WIRE ])--Prudential Financial, Inc., (NYSE: PRU) today announced that it has installed solar panels on its office building in Scottsdale, Arizona and in the two buildings of its Roseland, NJ office complex, producing an anticipated 2.3 million kilowatt hours of electricity annually and reducing the companya™s greenhouse gas emissions by 3.2 million pounds a year.

"Building these solar arrays underscores our commitment to investing in and leveraging alternative sources of energy to reduce our environmental footprint"

aBuilding these solar arrays underscores our commitment to investing in and leveraging alternative sources of energy to reduce our environmental footprint,a said Prudential Vice Chairman Mark Grier. aThey will pay for themselves within a relatively short time frame, which means they make sense financially as well as environmentally. These solar panels are important elements of the comprehensive approach Prudential has taken to reduce our carbon emissions by more than one third over the last ten years.a

Michael Perrette, vice president and head of Corporate Facilities at Prudential, said, aOver the next 10 years, we expect these solar panels to save us approximately $3 million in energy costs and help us further reduce our overall carbon footprint by around 14,300 metric tons. This project complements work we are doing across the company to reduce energy use and increase recycling.a He said the company plans to install solar panels in some of its other office buildings in the future.

The 2,678 panels installed in the Roseland buildings will generate approximately 3 percent of the power use in that office campus, with a peak power output of 500 kilowatt hours. The solar project in Scottsdale is the largest solar photovoltaic system on a commercial office building in Arizona. It involved installing 4,508 panels that generate approximately 30 percent of the buildinga™s power use, with a peak output of 885 kilowatt hours.

Perrette said using the solar panels in the two cities equates to more than 300 cars off the road, more than 160,000 gallons of gasoline not consumed each year and a reduction of almost 1,430 metric tons of carbon emissions.

The solar panel installation project in Scottsdale also included construction of a covered employee parking facility and the addition of several car charging stations. aWe hope these charging stations encourage the use of electric cars. In the coming years, we anticipate adding charging stations in other Prudential facilities as demand grows,a Perrette said.

Through its ongoing [ Commitment to the Environment ], Prudential is working to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and to help ensure environmental sustainability both in the U.S. and abroad. The company has recycling and Green IT and printing programs, and has investments in wind power and socially responsible investment funds. It also is a member of various environmentally-focused organizations and is committed to the disclosure of its domestic environmental footprint (Scopes 1 and 2) through the Carbon Disclosure Project. In 2007, Prudential made a commitment to achieve a 10 percent reduction in Greenhouse Gas emissions within five years.

Initiatives implemented by various Prudential business units and corporate centers have helped lower carbon emissions by about 18,000 tons a year, the equivalent of removing 3,300 cars from the road for one year. These include a migration to Energy Star computers; physical changes to data centers to reduce the number of servers used and energy consumption; two-sided printing;elimination of paper faxing in many areas and reduced paper use; reuse, recycling, sale, or donation of PDAs, cell phones, and PCs; purchasing equipment from agreena™-conscious manufacturers; a agreen printa™ procurement program designed to reduce the amount of paper used to print and copy documents; supporting alternative work arrangements; and participating in the TransitChek^® Transit Reimbursement Incentive Program where available to encourage employees to use mass transit. Earlier this year, one of the Roseland buildings earned the U.S. Environmental Protection Agencya™s prestigious Energy Star^® symbol for protecting the environment through superior energy efficiency.

Prudential Financial, Inc. (NYSE: PRU), a financial services leader with approximately $750 billion of assets under management as of September 30, 2010, has operations in the United States, Asia, Europe, and Latin America. Prudentiala™s diverse and talented employees are committed to helping individual and institutional customers grow and protect their wealth through a variety of products and services, including life insurance, annuities, retirement-related services, mutual funds, investment management, and real estate services. In the U.S., Prudentiala™s iconic Rock symbol has stood for strength, stability, expertise and innovation for more than a century. For more information, please visit [ http://www.news.prudential.com/ ].