Ocean State Job Lot (OSJL), a discount retailer with 150 stores across the region, has been honored with a 2022 Sustainability Leadership Award from the Business Intelligence Group.
The Sustainability Awards honor those people, teams and organizations who have made sustainability an integral part of their business practice or overall mission. In 2018, in an effort to lower their carbon footprint, OSJL made a $2 million investment to relamp their distribution center and a $12 million investment to replace the lighting in all of their store locations. As a direct result of energy modernization and a complete LED rollout, OSJL reduced their overall energy consumption by 17.4 million kWh in just one year. It also instituted a successful recycling program across all offices, facilities, and stores, which generated $1.14 million in revenue in 2021 and made OSJL a Net Zero Waste company.
In December 2021, OSJL announced a partnership with Ecogy Energy to host the largest rooftop solar portfolio in Rhode Island. The most recent installation, at the OSJL store at 1919 Diamond Hill Road in Woonsocket, R.I., added another 250kW to the Ocean State’s renewable distributed generation resources. This one particular system will generate roughly 5.5 million kilowatt-hours of electricity over the 20-year life of the project. That electricity is equivalent to the carbon sequestered by 4,943 acres of U.S. forest in one year, or offset 486 homes’ electricity use for one year, or the CO2 emissions from burning 453,941 gallons of gasoline.
“We are thrilled to be honored as a Sustainability Leader,” said Harry Oakley, Director of Energy, Sustainability, Procurement & Corporate Facilities at Ocean State Job Lot. “Ocean State Job Lot prides itself as a company that cares about people and the environment. This award is a much-deserved recognition of our team’s commitment to doing all we can to reduce our business’ carbon footprint and to hopefully inspire others in our position to do the same. We look forward to creating even more opportunities to make a positive impact on the planet.”
