Salesforce Announces Largest Renewable Energy Agreement to Date, on Path to Achieving 100 Percent Renewable Energy

SAN FRANCISCO, Aug. 30, 2018 /PRNewswire/ -- Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), the global leader in CRM, today announced the company's largest renewable energy agreement to date, the Bright Stalk Project, supporting 80 megawatts (MW) of new wind energy in Illinois—a critical milestone in the company's ongoing sustainability journey. This 15-year virtual power purchase agreement (VPPA) builds upon the company's previous two agreements, and further advances Salesforce's commitment to reaching 100 percent renewable energy by 2022.

Salesforce is committed to harnessing the company's culture of innovation to improve the state of the world and drive toward equality for all. The company has achieved net-zero greenhouse gas emissions globally and delivers a carbon neutral cloud to all our customers.

Salesforce's new investment in wind energy is expected to generate enough clean electricity to power more than 27,000 Illinois homes annually. The Bright Stalk Project, which is owned and will be operated by EDP Renewables, is scheduled to be completed by the end of 2019 and will also create hundreds of full-time jobs during construction and several permanent jobs during the life of the project.

Salesforce Steps Up at Global Climate Action Summit
As a major sponsor of Global Climate Action Summit (GCAS), taking place September 12-14 in San Francisco, Salesforce will join state and local governments, businesses and citizens from around the world to highlight the actions already underway, report on game-changing climate innovations, and catalyze bold new commitments to drive urgently needed climate change solutions.

In May 2018, Christiana Figueres, Convenor of Mission 2020, issued a global challenge to the technology sector to dramatically "step up" climate action and drive down their company's carbon emissions by 2020. In response to this challenge, Salesforce is proud to announce it has been working with a diverse group of companies to accelerate climate action within individual businesses, via their value chains and across the global economy, to help bend the curve of emissions by 2020. This group of companies are aligning behind a new declaration, and delivering a series of associated commitments that will be announced at GCAS on September 13 at 4pm PT.

Comments on the News:

• "At Salesforce, we are committed to a sustainable future and healthy planet for everyone," said Suzanne DiBianca, Salesforce executive vice president, corporate relations and chief philanthropy officer. "In addition to reaching Net Zero greenhouse gas emissions and delivering a carbon neutral cloud to all our customers, today's announcement is a critical step toward our goal in powering our operations with 100 percent renewable energy by 2022. All of our commitments reinforce the notion that businesses are an important platform for change and should operate in a way that protects our planet for future generations."
  
  
• "We have a collective responsibility to raise ambition, scale up our actions and move forward faster together to safeguard the sustainable development goals and protect the inalienable right to life of our and future generations," said Christiana Figueres, Convenor of Mission 2020. "It's inspiring to see companies like Salesforce step up their commitments to climate leadership and I look forward to seeing additional future contributions as we all work together to secure a turning point on greenhouse gas emissions by 2020."
  
  
• "EDP Renewables applauds Salesforce's commitment to powering its operations by renewable energy sources," said João Manso Neto, EDP Renewables CEO. "Investments by corporate purchasers like Salesforce continue to drive the growth of EDP Renewables' North American platform as well as the wind industry as a whole."

Salesforce celebrates commitment to sustainability through local community
As the largest technology employer in San Francisco, Salesforce is deeply committed to engaging the community in which its customers and employees live and work. As conversations around global climate change come to Salesforce's hometown, the company will host several events to include its local community in climate action activities and learning.

• The company will enable 1,000 Bay Area middle school students to visit California Academy of Sciences for special ocean and climate programming. This comes on the heels of an Ocean and Climate Science curriculum course for 40+ teachers, held onsite at Salesforce headquarters.
• Salesforce will bring together a diverse, global group of innovators for a two-day immersive hack to develop ocean health solutions, prototypes, research and findings, and films that will be open-sourced.
• The Central Plaza at Salesforce Park will be transformed into a temporary art gallery, open to the public, showcasing artists that use their creativity as a platform to create awareness around global climate issues.
• In addition, Salesforce employees are committing to more than 1,000 hours volunteering at the events, for California Coastal Cleanup Day and with their local communities and nonprofits around the world.
• Renowned French artist JR and Oscar-nominated American filmmaker Darren Aronofsky collaborated on The Standing March, a major public video projection exhibited in Paris during the UN's COP21 climate conference in 2015. Salesforce is working with the city of San Francisco to have the projection displayed on City Hall in San Francisco to remind leaders that the world is watching as they gather at GCAS.

Connect with Salesforce

• Like Salesforce on Facebook: http://facebook.com/salesforce
• Follow @salesforce on Twitter: http://twitter.com/salesforce
• Learn more about sustainability at Salesforce: https://www.salesforce.com/sustainability/
• Read the Salesforce corporate blog here.
• Learn more about Salesforce's Clean Energy Strategy here.

About Salesforce
Salesforce, the global CRM leader, empowers companies to connect with their customers in a whole new way. For more information about Salesforce (NYSE: CRM), visit: www.salesforce.com and for information on Salesforce's sustainability efforts, visit: salesforce.com/sustainability

SOURCE Salesforce

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