Green Options

Candy giant MARS, parent company of M&M’S®, DOVE®, MILKY WAY®, SNICKERS®, 3 MUSKETEERS®, and TWIX®, turned on a huge new solar array (a “solar garden”) at its headquarters in New Jersey today. No matter what you think of candy food like this, it is good to see such a company going solar. Popular with millions, billions perhaps, and about as mainstream as you can imagine, this is a good step for solar’s more widespread use across the country.

This facility is PSEG Solar Source’s first large-scale solar project. It is one of the largest solar projects in the state of New Jersey, which is already 2nd only to California in its amount of installed solar capacity. The MARS headquarters adjacent to the solar garden is the workplace of about 1,200 employees and is where M&M’S® Brand Chocolate Candies are manufactured.

Public Service Electric and Gas (PSE&G) asked New Jersey regulators today to approve an ambitious $773 million plan to bring 120 MW of solar power to the state. The plan, which will use brownfields and underdeveloped properties for solar generation, will eliminate 1.7 million tons of CO2 emissions. It will also bring New Jersey 7 percent closer to its goal of getting 22.5 percent of its power from renewable energy by 2020.