Duke: Walmart making renewable energy affordable for everyone

It seemed like everyone had a take on President Barack Obama’s big climate change speech this week and among them was Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., president and CEO Mike Duke.

Walmart had a comment from Duke ready to go less than an hour after the President concluded his remarks on Tuesday at Georgetown University. As expected, Duke applauded the president and his administration for their commitment to renewable energy and conservation and then piggybacked on the speech to tout Walmart’s own accomplishments and commitment to the renewable energy and conservation.

"Investing in renewable energy and energy conservation are good for business, good for communities and good for the environment. When we use less energy, that's less energy we have to buy, and that means less waste and more savings for our customers," Duke said. "Over the last few years we've made meaningful progress towards our goal to be supplied by 100% renewable energy. Walmart now has over 300 renewable energy projects in operation or under development around the world, and the Environmental Protection Agency has named us the number one user of onsite renewable energy. As we continue on our journey we will continue to leverage our scale in purchasing energy so we can drive down technology costs and make renewable power more affordable for everyone."

The president’s speech addressed climate change, its impact and ways to combat it and he went on to describe a plan in broad terms that involves familiar approaches of using less dirty energy, more cleaner sources of energy and wasting less energy. See what you think of the plan and read the president’s comments by clicking here.

And check out what Obamahad to say two years earlier at Georgetown on the topic of America’s energy security by clicking here.