Community Updates

Star Power:
How Target’s ENERGY STAR Efficiency Savings Stack Up

In honor of Earth Month, we’re shining an LED light on some of the sustainable practices we use throughout our business every day. One we’re especially proud to share? Target was just named an ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year for the second year in a row. More than 1,400 of our buildings have earned ENERGY STAR status—the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)’s certification of energy efficiency. That’s more than any other retailer, and the number’s still growing as we work toward a goal to certify at least 80 percent of our buildings by 2020.

Published 7 years ago | About a 3 minute read

In honor of Earth Month, we’re shining an LED light on some of the sustainable practices we use throughout our business every day. One we’re especially proud to share? Target was just named an ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year for the second year in a row. More than 1,400 of our buildings have earned ENERGY STAR status—the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)’s certification of energy efficiency. That’s more than any other retailer, and the number’s still growing as we work toward a goal to certify at least 80 percent of our buildings by 2020.

Why shoot for the stars? It’s good for guests, our business and the community. Whenever Target moves into a neighborhood, we work with local partners to understand its needs and customize the new store with all the right features. That includes sustainable design elements that help us use energy efficiently and reduce our carbon footprint.

The results really add up: A typical certified Target store saves enough energy each year to power 100 homes! Check out a few standout features at some of our top ENERGY STAR locations:

Here’s a bright idea: We’ve installed more than 370,000 low-wattage LED light fixtures in stores across the country that reduce total electricity usage by an average of 10 percent.
Look up! More than 350 Target locations have rooftop solar installations, which produce enough energy to offset 15 to 40 percent of the stores’ energy. Our goal is to have 500 buildings with solar installations by 2020.
As a member of the EPA’s GreenChill program, we’re working to introduce hydrofluorocarbon (HFC)-free refrigerants in our food distribution centers (FDC) and refrigerated display cases in stores. Today, all of our FDC cold storage areas use HFC-free refrigerants and we have HFC-free refrigerated display cases in nearly 600 stores. These units not only save energy (up to 50 percent more efficient than the ones they replaced), they also eliminate greenhouse gasses that are thousands of times more powerful than carbon dioxide.
Keep on turning! Last summer, we embarked on our first wind power partnership in Texas, investing in the 211-megawatt Stephens Ranch Wind Project, and offsetting 100 percent of the energy used at 60 local stores.
When it rains, it pours. Good thing many of our stores are designed with storm water systems in the parking lot and grounds to harvest and clean rainwater, then send it back into the soil. We complement the native landscapes with features like rain gardens and catch basins that naturally slow and clean storm water runoff and prevent flooding.
We built eight of our Chicago stores with green roofs, featuring plantings and vegetation that soak up access rainwater, absorb heat and reduce pollution.

You may have heard about our plans to open more small format stores in dense urban areas and on college campuses. As the designs come together, we continue to focus on responsible growth—opening stores in previously developed sites—in the surrounding areas where our guests live and work, and near mass transit.