Our commitment to the environment extends beyond operating in compliance with applicable laws, regulations and requirements. We strive to not only act responsibly but also to serve in a leadership capacity in addressing the environmental challenges that impact our company and our stakeholders.
Review the policy that guides our environmental concerns.
This effort and its goals are guided by the Exelon Environment Policy, which contains a core set of principles that inform our decision-making.
Examine our efforts to reduce our carbon footprint.
Climate change represents one of the greatest challenges of our time, and demands that we actively pursue every opportunity to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. As a member of the voluntary EPA SF6 Emission Reduction Partnership for Electric Power Systems Program, we’re proactively working to prevent SF6 leaks on our equipment.
See how we are managing materials and properties more efficiently.
We’re recycling tons of materials in the office and in the field—reducing our carbon footprint, cutting the amount of waste going into landfills.
Project HERE (Helping the Environment by Recycling at Exelon) increased recycling more than 5% over the previous year. The more than 1.9 million pounds of recycled material includes paper, cardboard, plastic and glass containers, and aluminum cans.
Industrial Recycling incorporates recycling of copper, aluminum, steel, transformers and oil. More than 15 million pounds of metals and more than half a million gallons of oil were recycled yearly. These two programs offset thousands of tons of carbon emissions. We continue to build on their combined success while also actively searching for ways to green our supply chain.
In 2008, our parent company, Exelon, led the formation of the Electric Utility Industry Sustainable Supply Chain Alliance, along with 14 other electric utilities. The Alliance works to improve environmental performance in electric utility industry supply chains. This includes the development of voluntary consensus standards for evaluating the environmental attributes of key materials and services provided to the electric utility industry; the environmental performance of suppliers to the electric utility industry; and the environmental performance of an electric utility industry company’s supply chain operations.
Exelon was also the first U.S. based utility to join the Carbon Disclosure Project’s Supply Chain Leadership Collaboration. As part of our commitment, Exelon is asking top suppliers to voluntarily disclose their greenhouse gas emissions and energy consumption.
View our accomplishments in preserving and protecting wildlands and wildlife.
PECO has developed a comprehensive avian protection plan to reduce bird mortalities from electrocution. This plan includes establishing new distribution line construction standards, removing or relocating nests, providing employee training on avian management and establishing bird perch deterrents.
We support municipalities through the removal of diseased, weakened or tall-growing trees near our overhead power lines. PECO directs customers to the Arbor Day Foundation's educational materials about the benefits that trees can provide. Planting the right tree in the right place can enhance property values and increase a home's energy efficiency year-round.
PECO spends millions of dollars each year on tree clearance and vegetation management work around the company's 14,000 miles of electric transmission and distribution lines. This work ensures PECO maintains compliance with strict federal reliability standards for transmission system reliability.
PECO owns and maintains 12,000 acres of land used as electric transmission rights-of-ways (ROWs) in southeastern Pennsylvania, surrounding the company’s headquarters in Philadelphia. PECO is committed to employing Integrated Vegetation Management (IVM) on the company’s entire 12,000 acre system. Of these 12,000 acres, 3,626 acres are actively managed for conservation in the Standard Integrated Vegetation Management project. These sites are designed to promote the development of native, early successional vegetation communities that are compatible with electric transmission corridors, and to discourage the introduction or spread of exotic invasive species on the ROWs. Of the 3,636 acres managed for conservation, PECO manages 1,270 as native warm-season grassland habitat. We are also actively managing over 155 acres of converted native areas and have received 11 National Wildlife Federation (NWF) and 3 Wildlife Habitat Council (WHC) Certifications for our stewardship projects to date.
Wetlands are a vital part of a healthy natural ecosystem and serve the following functions: filters and cleanses surface water, reduces the effects of flooding by storing storm water and returning it to the water table, and serves as feeding and mating grounds for our valuable wildlife. At PECO it's our mission to protect and preserve these natural resources.
At PECO we are dedicated to protecting and preserving natural habitats throughout our service territory. In recent years, a number of species on federal, state, and local endangered lists have made their homes at PECO sites. We take our responsibility to protect endangered species seriously, and work with local government and civic groups to accommodate their needs while on our sites. Through partnerships with the state and other agencies PECO will continue to provide reliable electric service while preserving Pennsylvania’s natural habitats.
Our EMS assigns roles and responsibilities at each level of our organization.
To execute this policy, we have established an environmental management program or system (EMS) that assigns roles and responsibilities at each level of our organization. The EMS is an integral part of the Exelon Management Model, the framework for the way we do business.
Our EMS received ISO 14001 Certification in November 2008. ISO 14001 Certification is the globally recognized “gold” standard for promoting effective, systematic management of environmental risks and liabilities. ISO 14001 contributes to our goal of implementing an EMS and strengthens our position as an industry environmental leader.
Our EMS is a continual cycle of planning, implementing, reviewing and improving the processes and actions that we undertake to meet our business and environmental goals. Built on the "Plan, Do, Check, Act" model, our EMS enables ComEd to take the following actions:
Through ongoing support of our EMS program and execution of our environmental policy, our stakeholders can expect to see continued improvement in Exelon’s environmental performance.
