Pet Care: Green Initiative on CBS 5 News – Pet Camp

Businesses are finding that going green can help them stay in the black. Linda Yi tell us it’s already paying off for some San Francisco business owners. The polar ice cap is turning to Arctic slush. Hurricanes are destroying communities, and unbearable summer heat are all evidence global warming is slowly hurting Earth.
Now some San Francisco businesses are working hard to go green. Take Pet Camp, a boarding facility for dogs and cats. One of 50 businesses recognized by the city of San Francisco as environmentally responsible, where recycling is their middle name, conservation their game. It really all started frankly during the energy crisis when we were having rolling blackouts.
So Mark Claiman installed 20-foot low-speed ceiling fans to circulate fresh air. And they move 68,000 cubic feet per minute of air using 58 watts of power. So less than a light bulb’s worth of power. We now have two of those when we used to have 13 of those.
He bought the newest generation fluorescent bulbs which use less power and installed a solar panel system for electricity, a $280,000 investment. PG&E paid half. I can tell you in terms of our electric bill alone, it went from about $25,000 a year to about $9,000 a year.
So everything from how they dispose of their poop to all their disinfectants are considered friendly to the environment. In fact, doggie poop is scooped and dumped into biodegradable bags and sent to East Bay MUD’s biomass facility which turns it into electricity. Pet Camp is the poster business for the city’s Department for the Environment which inspects, verifies and awards the green certificate.