Growing the Gulf Coast: Aker Solutions aims to decrease carbon footprint 50% by 2030

MOBILE, Ala. (WKRG) — You wouldn’t think that a company that supports oil and gas drilling would have an emphasis on reducing its carbon footprint. But that’s the case at Mobile’s Aker Solutions. Meteorologist Colleen Peterson spent the day there to see how the company is making an impact.

“For this country and the world to sustain itself, we are going to have to come up with renewable energy solutions and ways to decrease your carbon footprint,” said James Altieri, Subsea US HSSE Manager at Aker Solutions. “Decarbonizing the oil and gas projects around the world — that’s our specialty.”

Some of those solutions are being developed right here on the Gulf Coast. The facility in Mobile builds something called umbilicals. Think of it like an extension cord that can power oil and gas platforms — like the ones you see out in the Gulf of Mexico.

With this and other clean energy solutions, Aker has an ambitious goal — decrease their carbon footprint by 50 percent by 2030.

In under a year, they have already reduced carbon emissions by 28 percent. Some of the things they’ve done to get there are something simple and easy that you could even do at home.

“We changed all of the lightings from old lighting to LED lighting,” James said.

Another change Aker made at their 200-acre facility in Mobile is using electric golf carts to get around instead of cars. They replaced forklifts with electric dollies. Most materials used at the facility are recyclable.

“We try to do our part to be a green company,” James said.

The company is doing what they can to help promote renewable energy and save the environment.

This story originally appeared on WKRG by Colleen Peterson. You can view the original story online here.