Tree Pittsburgh receives grant for solar expansion

Tree Pitts­burgh is pleased to announce it has been award­ed a $15,000 grant by West Penn Pow­er Sus­tain­able Ener­gy Fund (WPPSEF) for their Her­itage Nurs­ery on the Alleghe­ny Riv­er. The solar pan­els will be added to the roof of Tree Pittsburgh’s new sus­tain­able cam­pus build­ing and help the nurs­ery to con­tin­ue to lead the way for sus­tain­able agri­cul­ture in our region. The orga­ni­za­tion received match­ing funds from the Next Gen­er­a­tion Fund of the Roy A. Hunt Foun­da­tion to com­plete the solar array.

Tree Pitts­burgh is in its final phase of fundrais­ing for the com­ple­tion of its new head­quar­ters, itself designed to achieve LEED Plat­inum and Net-Zero Ener­gy Cer­ti­fi­ca­tions. Built on the for­mer Tip­pins Steel Mill, the facil­i­ty serves as a cam­pus for the orga­ni­za­tion and includes new offices and an edu­ca­tion cen­ter, as well as the Her­itage Nursery.

With the com­ple­tion of the new cam­pus, the Her­itage Nurs­ery will grow to 3 acres (on a total 5‑acre site). The tree nurs­ery is where Tree Pitts­burgh grows plant mate­r­i­al used in the organization’s refor­esta­tion plant­i­ngs, as well as for oth­er region­al orga­ni­za­tions, land trusts, water­shed groups, and munic­i­pal­i­ties. The nurs­ery is one of a kind in the region and this grant for solar pan­els will con­tin­ue to set the Her­itage Nurs­ery apart from oth­er nurs­eries in the area.

“Due to the gen­er­ous sup­port of WPPSEF, we’ll be able to com­plete the solar instal­la­tion on our nurs­ery. This will allow us to pow­er our nurs­ery and allow us to achieve our vision of a Net-Zero Ener­gy cer­ti­fied cam­pus,“ said Megan Palo­mo, Her­itage Nurs­ery Direc­tor. “We hope our Her­itage Nurs­ery will serve as a mod­el for sus­tain­able agri­cul­ture across Pennsylvania.”

Joel Mor­ri­son, WPPSEF Fund Admin­is­tra­tor, stat­ed: “WPPSEF is proud to work with Tree Pitts­burgh to achieve a Net-Zero ener­gy cam­pus. The effort fits well into our mis­sion of pro­mot­ing solar PV while improv­ing our com­mu­ni­ty health. Tree Pitts­burgh grew out of cit­i­zen con­cern for the health and well­be­ing of the City’s urban for­est and WPPSEF is pleased to sup­port their vision to cre­ate a healthy urban for­est for all by inspir­ing and engag­ing peo­ple to main­tain, plant, and pro­tect trees.

Tree Pitts­burgh is an envi­ron­men­tal non-prof­it orga­ni­za­tion ded­i­cat­ed to enhanc­ing com­mu­ni­ty vital­i­ty by restor­ing and pro­tect­ing the urban for­est through tree plant­i­ng and care, edu­ca­tion, and advocacy.

The West Penn Pow­er Sus­tain­able Ener­gy Fund (WPPSEF) is a 501(c)(3) non­prof­it orga­ni­za­tion that invests in the deploy­ment of sus­tain­able ener­gy tech­nolo­gies that ben­e­fit West Penn Pow­er ratepay­ers in Penn­syl­va­nia. WPPSEF invest­ments are focused in three broad categories:

• Deploy­ment of sus­tain­able and clean ener­gy technologies;
• Deploy­ment of ener­gy effi­cien­cy and con­ser­va­tion tech­nolo­gies; and
• Facil­i­tat­ing eco­nom­ic devel­op­ment, envi­ron­men­tal bet­ter­ment, and pub­lic edu­ca­tion as they relate to sus­tain­able ener­gy deploy­ment in the WPP ser­vice region.

Vis­it http://www.wppsef.org for fur­ther infor­ma­tion. YouTube – Lis­ten to what our project part­ners have to say about us.