Going Green Wins Awards

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Created on Wednesday, 30 April 2014 15:30

Written by Elyssa Ellis

ST. JOHNSBURY-Local car dealerships are doing their part in going green, St. Johnsbury and Lamoille Valley Ford in Hardwick are being recognized for their efforts of going green. They are receiving the 2014 Governor's Award for Environmental Excellence.

The awards have been given out since 1993 to businesses that are environmentally conscious. Since then more than two hundred organizations, institutions, public agencies, and businesses have been recognized for their efforts to conserve and protect natural resources, prevent pollution, and promote environmental sustainability.
These two dealerships are just five of the Vermont Businesses that are being recognized.

Lamoille Valley and Twin State Ford are being recognized for their campaign to promote the sale of plug-in electric hybrid vehicles. "Lamoille Valley Ford and Twin State Ford actually have the same owner. Mr. Dan Keene. He setup a challenge last September that we set up for thirty energies in thirty days. We actually blew that out of the water, we actually went fifty-five energies in thirty days. By doing that that made us one of the number one energy dealers in the country." Timothy Letourneau the Digital Marketing Director said.

"We almost doubled our goal, and in doing so our dealerships became number one and number two Ford dealers in the United States in Ford plug-in electric sales for that month," Dan Keen the Owner of Twin Valley Ford said.

The Environmental Excellence Awards are recognized in four different categories they are: businesses, non-profit organizations, municipal organizations and educational institutions.
"I'm very prideful that we got this award. It means a lot to us because you know for a car dealership to get an environmental award is kind of unheard of and so we're proud of that," Keene said.

To be eligible for the award, projects must be located in Vermont, and have been initiated within the past three years and have been fully operational for at least one year. Another requirement to be considered is that each applicant must be in good standing with environmental laws and regulations with no formal enforcement actions within he past three years.

Some of the other recipients are Highfields Center for Composting, AllEarth Renewables, and SunCommon.The twenty-one award-winning organizations will be recognized at the Vermont Businesses for Social Responsibility Annual Spring Conference. That conference in May fourteenth at the University of Vermont.