HONOREE SIZE & INDUSTRY: Mid-Size – Energy

COMPANY OVERVIEW

Vistra is a leading, integrated, Fortune 275 retail electricity and power generation company based in Irving, Texas, providing essential resources for customers, commerce, and communities. Vistra combines an innovative, customer-centric approach to retail with safe, reliable, diverse, and efficient power generation. The company brings its products and services to market in 20 states and the District of Columbia, including six of the seven competitive wholesale markets in the U.S., and markets in Canada and Japan as well. Serving nearly 5 million residential, commercial, and industrial retail customers with electricity and natural gas, Vistra is the largest competitive residential electricity provider in the country and offers over 50 renewable energy plans. The company is also the largest competitive power generator in the U.S. with a capacity of approximately 39,000 megawatts powered by a diverse portfolio, including natural gas, nuclear, solar, and battery energy storage facilities. In addition, the company is a large purchaser of wind power. The company is currently constructing a 400-MW/1,600-MWh battery energy storage system in Moss Landing, California, which will be the largest of its kind in the world when it comes online. Not only is Vistra committed to powering communities across the world, they are also committed to sustainability and always “doing business the right way.”

SUSTAINABLE BUSINESS STRATEGY

Sustainability at Vistra means using the least amount of scarce resources possible to meet the needs of society, as people use its essential products with the lowest possible impact on the environment. Vistra’s commitment to Texas has always gone far beyond generating and providing electricity – they are invested in the communities across the state where they live and work. Their core principles guide every action they take and each decision they make. Vistra believes in doing business the right way – and that includes operating in a safe and environmentally-sound manner for the well-being of the public and their employees, providing community support, contributing to the state’s economic development, and respecting and engendering diversity in their workforce and suppliers. From the generation of electricity to the products and services Vistra provides to its customers and communities, Vistra’s team members are focused on efficiency in their operations and helping others manage their everyday electricity needs at the lowest cost for the value received. 

Vistra has achieved the following:

• More than 50 renewable energy plans available to customers
• Over $3.5 M in charitable giving across 11 states in 2019 alone
• 85,000+ acres of land reclaimed
• 39% decrease in GHG emissions since 2010 with approximately 60% decrease based on announced plant retirements
• More than 19,000 MW retired or announced retirements of power plants, primarily coal-fueled, since 2010
• And more!

EMPLOYEE LEADERSHIP

Vistra works as a team and is committed to all of its employees, in everything they do and to the success of their company. Collaboration, information sharing, and cross-functional teamwork are fundamental to how Vistra conducts its day-to-day activities.

Vistra team member, Sid Stroud, director of environmental services, has spent his entire career with the company. In May, he celebrated his 46th work anniversary! Sid has been an integral part of the company’s unprecedented work in land reclamation excellence and has been personally committed to Vistra’s efforts in environmental education at both the secondary and college levels.

Vistra has a variety of employee-initiated and led programs for individuals to participate in, based on demographics, interests, and purpose, one of which is the TXU Green Team. The Green Team promotes environmental stewardship and sustainable practices that reduce Vistra’s impact on the planet, create value for the business and the community, and continue to make TXU Energy a great place to work.

Vistra employees company-wide are provided with deskside recycle containers for commingled recyclables including paper, plastic, glass, and aluminum. In 2019, through Vistra’s deskside recycling program, employees recycled 14 tons of waste and shredded nearly 322 tons of paper at. Additionally, Vistra collects and recycles annual consumer goods such as batteries and electronics for employees, resulting in 19,601 pounds of electronics in 2019 from 2000+ employees at Dallas-area offices alone.

CONSERVATION PROGRAMS

Climate Leadership

In 2019, Vistra joined the Climate Leadership Council as a founding member, advocating for a carbon fee and dividend approach as the ideal public policy to incentivize investments in carbon-free and carbon-reducing technologies while mitigating the financial impacts on the economically disadvantaged. 

Vistra is investing in renewables and batteries in Texas and in other markets they serve. Vistra recently launched Vistra Zero, a portfolio of zero-carbon assets to power America. As part of this announcement, the company is investing $850 million in Texas over the next two years to develop six new solar projects and an additional battery energy storage facility, totaling nearly 1,000 MW. This builds on the more $700 million in renewables and batteries, including 180 MW of solar and 10 MW of batteries in Upton County, Texas. Vistra has nearly 3,000 MW of additional solar and battery development projects in the pipeline, many of which are in Texas, and an expectation of spending multi-billions of dollars on renewables and batteries over the next 10 years.

In 2020, Vistra accelerated its greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets. Vistra is now setting out to achieve a 60% reduction, up from 50%, in Scope 1 CO2 equivalent emissions by 2030 as compared to a 2010 baseline, and a long-term objective to achieve net-zero carbon emissions, up from an 80% carbon reduction target, by 2050. With their eye set on the prize, Vistra has achieved 65% of their targeted 2030 goal!

Tree Plantings & Donations

In 2019, Vistra donated nearly 500 trees and approximately 3,300 liners or seedlings through its tree donation program, in which the company helps create healthy and sustainable communities by partnering with its customer cities, counties, schools, and nonprofits to provide trees for schools, parks, libraries, and various community facilities.

Since 2002, Vistra’s flagship retail brand, TXU Energy, has provided nearly 300,000 trees to communities under the company’s Trees Across Texas program and through its longstanding partnership with the Texas Trees Foundation, a 2018 Texan by Nature Conservation Wrangler. Through these tree donations, TXU Energy has helped generate environmental savings and health benefits for municipalities and residents valued at approximately $37 million annually during the life of the trees.

Land Reclamation & Wildlife Conservation 

Vistra is committed to continuous improvement of environmental protection measures, sustainability, and – with a program that has lasted decades through Vistra’s generation subsidiary Luminant – land reclamation. Vistra’s roots in Texas go back nearly 140 years, and they are one of the largest landowners in the state. When their sites reach the end of their productive life, they restore them – and in many cases improve the land to better than it was originally. Vistra has reclaimed more than 85,000 acres, planted more than 42 million native trees, and created or enhanced more than 6,800 acres of wetlands, ponds, and stream channels on their restored lands, dramatically increasing water resources for the benefit of wildlife and livestock. Notable examples over the years include:

• In June 2019, Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD) notified Luminant that five juvenile whooping cranes the agency was tracking via GPS transmitters were on the company’s property in the far south side of Limestone County. The company took immediate steps to protect the unexpected guests, including posting notice for care and protection, since awareness helps prevent disturbance.
• In 2014, the company helped TPWD’s Eastern wild turkey restoration efforts, releasing over 80 turkeys on 10,000 acres of reclaimed land, restoring the birds to their historical range in East Texas.
• In 2013, Luminant found a permanent home for more than 100 rare carnivorous pitcher plants found on its land in Freestone County, donating them to the Dallas Arboretum’s Rory Meyers Children’s Adventure Garden to help “plant the seed” of environmental awareness and stewardship with future generations.
• In 2012, Luminant began an ongoing partnership with TPWD to reestablish thousands of acres for bobwhite quail and other grassland bird species that had suffered from changing land-use practices across the country. Crews planted 40,000 pounds of native grass and flowering plant seed across 1,200 acres of the company’s land in Limestone and Robertson counties to help rehabilitate existing land as a habitat for grassland birds.
• Starting in 2010, Luminant made available hundreds of acres at its Squaw Creek Park in Hood County to local high school students for a habitat restoration project to attract native birds, including the bobwhite quail, which nests on the ground, and the eastern bluebird. During the multi-year project, invasive grasses were cleared and replaced with native varieties. The project included TPWD, the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, Texas Master Naturalists, and bird enthusiasts.
• Bald eagle sightings have increased at several other company sites, with nesting populations returning annually to the Tatum area. Additionally, interior least terns, a federally listed endangered species, have annually used the reclaimed sites for their nesting.

Importantly, Vistra has accomplished all of this while generating affordable and reliable electricity that has helped power the unprecedented Texas economy for generations, all while spending hundreds of millions of dollars to reduce emissions and restore their sites to an equivalent if not better condition.

Sustainable Infrastructure

Vistra’s corporate headquarters, located in Irving, Texas, has received the EPA’s prestigious Energy Star recognition for the past decade, and a handful of their regional offices have received the honor as well. As a steward of environmental conservation efforts, Vistra has implemented procedures at its headquarters to reduce power consumption when power is at its peak demand in the Texas summer.

In addition, their Dallas-area corporate facilities utilize building automation systems to optimize start/stop times of HVAC equipment to reduce energy consumption and utilizes LED lights and occupancy sensors to save energy as well. Vistra’s headquarters and other office locations feature electric vehicle charging stations for employees, contractors, and visitors to use.

BUILDING A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE

Conservation and sustainability are continually evolving, and today Vistra is seeing broader interest from more diverse groups. Increasingly, investors are interested in the environmental, social, and governance (ESG) activities undertaken by companies, to measure the sustainability and societal impact of a business. But ESG is nothing new for Vistra, over the years the company has been at the forefront of environmental stewardship and innovation. 

Today, Vistra continues to deliver on its commitment to provide reliable and increasingly clean sources of electricity to help meet the needs of a growing population and move toward an even more environmentally sound future. While it has a deep history of protecting the environment, including conservation, Vistra has expanded reporting of its environmental footprint and expects to significantly reduce its emissions and usage of natural resources as it invests in new technologies to generate electricity.

Vistra’s stewardship begins with maintaining an excellent compliance record that meets or outperforms all applicable federal and state environmental laws and regulations. No one has more experience than Vistra in generating electricity in an environmentally responsible way and with an exceptional track record of reducing emissions. The company is committed to technology development, renewable energy, battery energy storage, and zero-emission nuclear generation that will improve the quality of the environment for all. Vistra has focused its energies on being socially and environmentally responsible since its predecessor companies first turned on electric lights in Texas in 1882, and Vistra continues to look forward to powering the future.

As Vistra moves into the next decade, it will retire approximately 7,000 MW of additional coal generation and invest in approximately 6,000 MW of renewables and battery storage between now and 2030. Vistra is focused on becoming a clean energy company with expectations that more than half of its EBITDA and generation capacity will be derived from zero-carbon sources by 2030. This transformation of their generation portfolio, combined with their existing low-emitting natural gas fleet and leading retail business with significant and growing “green” offerings for their customers, is the Vistra of the future.

TEXAN-LED CONSERVATION

An unmatched economy, business-friendly political environment, and a positive and productive regulatory environment make Texas the ideal place for Vistra to operate and call home. With Texas roots stretching back nearly 140 years, Vistra and its predecessors have always called the Lone Star State “home.” At Vistra, they play to win and believe in the power of competition to spark innovation and unleash benefits for their customers. That philosophy is fully supported by the state’s unique power market, Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which operates independently from other power regions in the country. Vistra is also proud to help the communities where its employees and customers live, work, and grow. Although its business has grown far beyond the borders of Texas, the heart of Vistra’s business is here, and some of its most valuable partnerships are with agencies and nonprofits across the Lone Star state, dedicated to uplifting less fortunate Texans. 

Learn more about Vistra’s sustainability efforts.

Definitions:

– MW or Megawatts are used to measure the output of a power plant or the amount of electricity required by an entire city. One MW = 1,000 kilowatts = 1,000,000 watts. 

– EBITDA is essentially net income (or earnings) with interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization added back.

– Greenhouse gases or GHG, is a gas that absorbs and emits radiant energy within the thermal infrared range. Greenhouse gases cause the greenhouse effect on planets. The primary greenhouse gases in Earth’s atmosphere are water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and ozone.

– HVAC or Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning is the technology of indoor and vehicular environmental comfort. Its goal is to provide thermal comfort and acceptable indoor air quality. An automated HVAC system is more expensive than your standard model, but it’s an investment. It can cut your energy bill by around 20 percent, paying for itself over time.