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Who Is Eligible to Participate?

Eligibility

All businesses, nonprofits, colleges/universities and municipalities with operations in Southwestern Pennsylvania are invited to participate in the Pittsburgh Green Workplace Challenge.

We invite K-12 schools to participate in the GWC, or participate in our 3-month pilot Schools program coming this fall 2016. Contact for more info. 

In order to be eligible to compete, you must:

Operate in at least one building within Southwestern Pennsylvania, and have continually occupied that space since at least May 2015.

Measure performance in one of the following three resource areas outlined in the competition guidebook:

  • Energy
  • Water
  • Materials Management
  • Transportation
  • Air Quality
  • Engagement
  • Social Equity

Register for the competition on the Green Workplace Challenge website by August 31, 2016.

Although it is not required to create and update an EPA Portfolio Manager account to compete in the GWC, it is highly recommended. Many competition points are associated with information regarding energy measurement through EPA’s Portfolio Manager.

If your organization has been located in its current facility for less than one year, you will be unable to input adequate utility information in EPA’s Energy Star Portfolio Manager to create a baseline. Portfolio Manager requires 12 months of prior utility usage data to establish a baseline; therefore only organizations that are able to establish baselines are eligible for energy measurement actions.

Competition Categories

Business and nonprofit organizations will compete in one of three categories determined by size — Micro (fewer than 10 employees); Small (fewer than 75 employees); Medium (fewer than 499 employees); or Large (500+ employees). All colleges/universities and municipalities will be competing against one another in separate categories.

Additionally, this year competitors have the option to join on a neighborhood team with fellow GWC participants. At the end of the competition, all points accrued by each individual organization in a neighborhood teams will be added together. These totals will be compared to those of other competing neighborhoods in the GWC Finale.

Upon completion of the Pittsburgh Green Workplace Challenge, a winner will be announced for each category. All competitors will also be recognized based on the points they earned over the course of the competition. Note: Competitors who join a team will still be eligible for individual recognition.