​WASHINGTON, D.C. (Oct. 14, 2021) – Pepco today announced a major climate change commitment, launching a multi-faceted, action-oriented effort to help the state of Maryland achieve its clean energy and climate goals. Together, with similar commitments made today by Exelon sister companies BGE and Delmarva Power, Pepco is taking significant steps to advance initiatives that will help make our communities cleaner and safer for generations to come and support Exelon's broader "Path to Clean," which will cut emissions from operations by at least half by 2030 and achieve net zero operational emission by 2050.

As part of the commitment, Pepco will focus on actionable measures to reduce its greenhouse gas footprint by at least 50 percent by 2030, deliver innovative solutions that will empower customers to meet their climate change objectives, and drive collaborative efforts with stakeholders and community partners to achieve greater greenhouse gas reduction across Maryland, while continuing efforts to address the impacts of climate change.

"We must take action now to address the severe impacts of climate change," said Donna Cooper, Pepco region president. "From projects that will make the local energy grid smarter, stronger, and cleaner, to efforts that will make our operations even more efficient, we are taking these important steps to support our customers and the communities where we live and work and to help ensure a cleaner, healthier environment for the future, equitably and inclusively."

Maryland Governor Larry Hogan and the Maryland legislature have taken major steps to advance the state's clean energy and climate goals. The state's Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reduction Act calls for a reduction of emissions of 40 percent by 2030 (from 2006 levels), and the renewable portfolio standard goal of 50 percent by 2030 is among the most aggressive in the country. Pepco's efforts directly support these goals.

"We applaud the great work by Governor Hogan and the Maryland State Legislature, along with support from the Maryland Public Service Commission, in creating a clean and sustainable future for generations to come," said Cooper. "We strongly support these efforts, along with the significant efforts being led by both Prince George's and Montgomery counties, with our own actions and initiatives that we are ensuring are implemented in an equitable and affordable way." 

Pepco has established a series of initiatives to reduce its own carbon footprint as quickly and efficiently as possible, while ensuring the readiness and resilience of the local energy grid to foster a cleaner and more efficient energy economy. In August, Pepco joined its sister Exelon utilities in committing to reducing operations related emissions by at least 50 percent, as compared to a 2015 baseline, by 2030 and to ultimately achieve net-zero emissions by 2050 as part of the Exelon Utilities-wide "Path to Clean" commitment. These commitments include:

• Transitioning to clean energy use for its own buildings, including purchasing 50 percent renewable electricity by the end of 2025.
• Installing energy efficient lighting at all Pepco office buildings and substation facilities as the company works to further modernize its buildings through 2026.
• Completing energy audits to identify additional energy savings opportunities at its major facilities, including the Forestville and Rockville service buildings.
• Electrifying 50 percent of the company's passenger vehicles and medium-duty fleet by 2030.
• Installing additional electric vehicle charging infrastructure at company facilities.
• Reducing SF6 Impacts by using non SF6 containment equipment wherever possible and enhance monitoring and equipment modernization to help reduce SF6 emissions from existing equipment. 
• Creatively using company-owned land including reduced mowing, installation of nest platforms for birds, planting of pollinator friendly plants, and signing onto the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Services Candidate Conversation Agreement for the Monarch Butterfly, which would provide habitat for the butterfly on company rights-of-way.
• Activating company employees to encourage the use of public transportation and rideshare, and to measure and improve their own individual GHG footprint.
• Enhancing the overall resilience of company infrastructure and continuing to assess impacts of climate change on the electric system, taking action to mitigate climate risk and investing to make the grid smarter, stronger and cleaner.
  

While Pepco is taking steps to enhance its own operations, the company has committed to helping customers achieve their climate change goals as well, by empowering them to manage their energy use, take advantage of clean and renewable technologies and reduce emissions through a number of innovative products and programs including:

• Expanding energy efficiency programs to help customers further reduce their energy use to collectively save more than 1 million megawatt hours by 2023.
• Providing an Energy Marketplace where customers have quick and easy access to discounted energy efficient products like LED bulbs, thermostats, advanced power strips, and more.
• Simplifying the switch to solar by improving interconnection processes through a new system called "Connect The Grid" to better support customers and contractors in tracking and connecting their solar projects to the local energy grid. 
• Advancing the electric vehicle (EV) revolution through our EVsmart program by installing a network of 250 Level 2 EV smart chargers and Direct Current Fast Chargers that will be located across Maryland and are available to all EV drivers.
• Providing interest-free on-bill financing to help small businesses finance energy efficiency projects and overcome the financial barriers to making these changes that help improve efficiency and drive down costs. 
• Provide valuable energy usage data to all customers to help them better manage their energy use and evaluating tools that would enable customers to share their energy usage with third-party service providers to help identify even more ways to save money and energy.
  

Pepco will continue to collaborate with government, community, civic, and non-profit partners across Maryland on innovative actions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, save money and energy, and build resilience. These initiatives include:   

• Enabling solar for income-limited customers by continuing participation in the Maryland Community Solar Pilot Program, where the company has helped to enable 12 megawatts of solar in its Maryland service area, with an additional 67 megawatts in the pipeline.   
• Creating shade and planting energy saving trees through a continuous partnership with the National Arbor Day Foundation to provide free trees for Pepco customers and communities.
• Awarding $125,000 in grants annually through Pepco's Sustainable Community Grants program, in partnership with Rock Creek Conservancy, to help communities preserve open space and build resilience.
• Engaging and educating students on climate change through Pepco and Exelon Foundation STEM program, where schools receive year-round tools and resources, including professional-development opportunities for teachers, hands-on classroom curriculum, energy audits of schools, turnkey materials to hold energy fairs at schools, field trips, and a small cash grant for additional supplies.
• Readying the local energy grid for future clean energy resources through an ongoing analysis and modeling to understand the investments needed to support the growth of distributed energy resources like solar, electric vehicles, and battery storage.
  

Customers, community partners and local stakeholders interested in learning more about Pepco's Climate Commitment can visit pepco.com/MDClimate.
 

To learn more about Pepco, visit The Source, our online newsroom. Find additional information by visiting pepco.com, on Facebook at facebook.com/pepcoconnect and on Twitter at twitter.com/pepcoconnect. Pepco's mobile app is available at pepco.com/mobileapp.