Estimated read time: 1-2 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Peter Corroon wants to see a greener Salt Lake County.
The county mayor has issued an executive order calling for more conservation-minded approaches in daily business.
"It's an administrative request to our departments that we expect them to be environmentally conservative in their actions," Corroon said. "We know we can do a lot to reduce waste, preserve our resources and conserve energy."
Corroon said the county expects agencies to take into account the environmental records of companies seeking contracts for government work and to recycle more, use less energy and conserve resources.
Salt Lake County has already invested in a central controller for watering county facilities, so the water can be turned off on rainy days or cool days when watering isn't necessary. Corroon said the command center was a $200,000 investment, which should quickly be recovered in savings.
A study found that the county can save up to $2 million yearly by watering less.
The county has also added five hybrid gas-electric vehicles and will continue to phase in others as older vehicles age. Automatic lights are being installed in county buildings so that when a room is empty, the lights will turn themselves off. And all county-owned traffic lights were replaced by energy-efficient bulbs over the past three years.
And the county is beginning to participate in Utah Power's Blue Sky program, in which power customers buy units of wind power.
Information from: Deseret Morning News,
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
