IKEA Goes With the Wind

IKEA, the furnishing giant, decided to power their shops in America using renewable resources. The company made two major investments into wind farms: one in Illinois, and another almost two times the size in Texas. The two plants have a very high potential, expected to provide energy needed for 90,000 American households.

Why Renewable Energy?

The company is very committed to environment preservation, and is willing to take strong action to improve the situation. This makes sense both on a sustainable, and a financial ground. The company will be able to increase the operations’ greenness and viability, while using natural resources with their full power. Furthermore, this allows the company to access cheap and reliable energy sources. This is not an isolated initiative since also other big companies such as Google, Microsoft, Walmart, Apple, and SunEdison bought wind farms.

What are the Future Plans?

IKEA plans to increase the number of turbines it operates to 279, and the number of solar panels installed with the current number being around 700,000. Future developments include the use of geothermal energy for heating and cooling in two stores in Colorado and Kansas.

However, IKEA didn’t limit themselves in the USA market; they already installed about 40,000 PV panels in the UK and more will come soon. Furthermore, solar panel installations have been implemented also in other countries, such as the Netherlands, with the final aim of turning to renewable energy more and more stores, and also in European countries.