Blackrock and Sustainability

St. Louis, Sustainability

Over the last three years, Blackrock Consulting has largely focused on sustainability projects and worked with environmental and social justice organizations. These projects have spanned from coordinating Grow Solar St. Louis, a residential rooftop solar group-buy and educational program, to helping with the Green Business Challenge and creating curriculum and trainings for Missouri Green Schools. We’ve also facilitated environmental justice trainings for earthday365’s board and  US Green Building Council Missouri Gateway Chapter‘s board and helped earthday365 with their Green Dining Alliance program.

The individuals who make up Blackrock have always been sustainably-minded people at home and in our personal lives – gardening with native plants, recycling, advocating for renewable energy and public transportation, and working for environmental justice in our neighborhoods – but the pandemic has helped us to realize that we could be doing more as a business when it comes to environmental and social stewardship.

Certified B Corporations go through a rigorous third-party certification process to ensure that they are considering their impacts on people and the planet throughout their business operations. There are only a few B Corps in St. Louis, including our friends and colleagues at StraightUp Solar, but the practice has become fairly common globally over the last few years – over 100,000 businesses have applied for the B Corp assessment since 2016.

We are currently in the evaluation phase of our B Corp assessment (UPDATE: awarded B Corp certification in December 2021), but this process has already helped us create a baseline for our social and environmental impact that we can track and improve over time. Once our application is approved, we’ll join a global community of leaders who are redefining what success in business means.

B Corp Certification covers internal governance, worker treatment, community impact, environmental impact, and the types of customers organizations serve.

To become a B Corp, we completed a rigorous assessment of our business practices and policies. Our assessment process included conducting a Greenhouse Gas Inventory, performing an employee service day with earthday365, installing on-site renewables (solar power) for two of our home offices, codifying our values in our operating documents and employee manual, and committing to purchasing Renewable Energy Credits to offset 100% of our carbon emissions.

In addition to seeking B Corp Certification, we joined the St. Louis Green Business Challenge at the Apprentice Level, becoming part of a network of sustainable business leaders in the region.

Both of these programs work as internal and external accountability tools, keeping us on track, providing ideas and resources for improvement over time, and connecting us to like-minded businesses here in St. Louis and around the country.

Sustainability is a journey, and we will likely never be finished working to improve our operations, but we are proud of our recent accomplishments and are excited to see what comes next for our tiny-but-mighty business.

The Blackrock team at a trash cleanup in Gravois Park
The Blackrock team at a earthday365’s Environmental Justice Day of Action in Gravois Park.

The Sun is Shining in STL! ☀️

Sustainability

In 2019, Blackrock Consulting partnered with the Missouri Botanical Garden’s EarthWays Center, Washington University, and the Midwest Renewable Energy Association on Grow Solar St. Louis, STL’s first-ever solar group buy program. The Grow Solar St. Louis pilot program shattered expectations, adding 424 killowatts of clean, renewable energy to our region.

What’s a Group Buy Program?

Solar group buy programs, sometimes called solarize programs in the industry, make installing solar panels more affordable for homeowners by creating an economy of scale. The more individuals who sign up for solar, the cheaper it becomes for everyone.

Group buy programs typically involve an educational element, (called Power Hours for Grow Solar St. Louis), where community members learn all about the process of going solar, from the science of how solar works to the logistics of instillation and the potential costs and incentives available to customers.

The education provided at Power Hours reduces research time for residents, as solar incentives, rebates, and processes vary by region and the volume of information can feel overwhelming to those unfamiliar with the industry.

A Power Hour at SqWires Restaurant and Annex in Layfayette Square.

Group buy programs have become more popular in recent years, especially those facilitated by the Midwest Renewable Energy Association, who has helped over 12 Midwestern cities generate over 11,000 kilowatts of power on 1,500 properties!

Blackrock’s Role

Blackrock’s Lisa Cagle, Jenn DeRose, and Adam Kepka were contracted by EarthWays Center to schedule and present at 23 Power Hours in the City of St. Louis, Maplewood, Richmond Heights, Clayton, and University City.

If our years of community engagement experience has taught us anything, it’s that people are far more likely to attend community meetings if food and beverages are available – especially beer! That’s why we decided to schedule Power Hours at places people want to visit, including the Schlafly Bottleworks, Urban Chestnut, and SqWires Restaurant and Annex. We also presented at community centers, libraries, Washington University, and even a print shop to reach as many different audiences as possible.

The presentations were fun and engaging, both for Blackrock staff and for our guests, who asked intelligent, thoughtful questions and kept us on our toes. Preparing for the Power Hours involved hours of research, practice, and conversations about the best ways to present complicated information to laypeople – a challenge that we were thrilled to take on. Making environmental information accessible for everyone is a passion for Blackrock’s sustainability team.

Blackrock presenting to a group at The Gezellig in The Grove.

Experts from StraightUp Solar, the contractor who won our original request for proposal, explained the more technical side of solar at each Power Hour and walked attendees through a case study of a typical home in our region’s instillation process. Over the course of our program, we educated over 640 individuals about solar power!

Solar education is better with beer.

In addition to Power Hours, Blackrock had the pleasure of tabling at events like the Green the Church Summit at New Northside Missionary Baptist Church and the STL Solar Expo and Symposium, providing information about solar power and EarthWays Center’s many sustainability programs to attendees.

Blackrock tables for Grow Solar and EarthWays Center at the Green the Church Summit at the New Northside Missionary Baptist Church.

STL’s Future is Bright 🌞

We expected this pilot program to do well, but we were blown away by the final numbers. 71 homes went solar during our pilot program, reducing emissions by 821,810 pounds in their first year of operation! These conscientious homeowners aren’t just doing their part to save the planet – they’re also saving money on their monthly energy bills (around $724 per year) and supporting local job growth. Renewable energy jobs employ 11 million people globally, and “Missouri is adding clean energy jobs faster than every other state in the Midwest,” according to Tradewind Energy).

The results of our first group buy program make it clear that STL is ready to go solar.

We are so proud to have been a part of this historic program and can’t wait to see what the future holds for sustainability in STL.

Be sure to follow us on Facebook to stay informed about our upcoming sustainability projects!