Wells Fargo Green Awards Winners

WSOC-TV made ‘going green’ a major priority and installed a huge solar farm on their front lawn. This was constructed in 2014 and currently supplies about 20% of Cox Media Group - Charlotte’s energy consumption. It is 214 kW DC. Annually it produces up to 302,000 kwh which reduces our facility carbon footprint by 204 tons. That is the equivalent of powering 27 average sized homes annually along with eliminating 36 automobiles from the streets. In 2016 they implemented a plan to transition to single stream recycling. Bins were distributed to every office and staff of 200 employees was encouraged to reduce paper consumption and waste. Trash pickup has been reduced down to 2 times per week and recycle production has almost doubled. They have transitioned from 46% to 70% in our zero-waste landfill effort.

In 2017 LED lighting was installed and incandescent and fluorescent bulbs were removed. Also two new energy efficient chillers to cool the south wing of our facility were installed. These replaced older models that were purchased in the 90’s and were not efficient. We are planning on replacing the north wing chiller with a new energy efficient unit by the end of the year.

Cousins Properties Incorporated owns and manages a 15.2 million square feet trophy office portfolio in the high-growth Sun Belt markets of Atlanta, Austin, Charlotte, Orlando, Tampa and Tempe. As a company Cousins is committed to sustainability. Across the main office buildings in its portfolio, greenhouse gas emissions are 9% lower than the US office building average. In addition, more than 60% of its total office portfolio square footage has achieved the Energy Star certification and 70% of its portfolio is LEED certified, which is more than three times the US office building sector average.

Cousins’ portfolio in Uptown Charlotte is over 3 million square feet and includes Gateway Village, a 1 million square foot complex on five acres along the West Trade corridor. In 2012, under the leadership of David Edwards, its Group Engineering Manager in Charlotte, the Cousins’ management team at Gateway Village launched an innovative water reclamation program that uses processed and treated ground water to supply its cooling towers, thereby decreasing the property’s dependence on municipal water. The new system successfully delivered 500,000 gallons of reclaimed water to the property’s cooling towers in the first month of installation alone. Over a three-year period Gateway Village’s municipal water consumption decreased by 56% and to date the property has saved over 15.5 million gallons of potable water. The system itself uses multi-stage filtration and ultraviolet disinfection for sanitizing the water without the use of harsh chemicals. Its track record of success and savings has led Cousins to consider implementing similar systems in its future developments across all markets.