Wild Mountain Awarded Carbon Neutral Certification

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- Temperature data from NASA and other government agencies shows record warming last year across the globe. This human-influenced climate change isn't a problem we are going to leave behind in 2020, unless we make some changes -- and that is exactly what one Minnesota ski park is doing.

Joe Yasis is the general manager of Wild Mountain ski area near Taylors Falls.

"We're working with Natural Capitol Partners to offset our carbon emissions that we are creating here," Yasis said.

Natural Capitol Partners works with businesses to erase their carbon footprint, and they just awarded Wild Mountain with a Carbon Neutral Certification due to their financial support of a carbon reduction project.

"Working with a landfill project in Senica, New York to help capture methane that's coming out of the landfills to help offset the carbon emissions that are happening here at Wild Mountain ski area," Yasis said.

Wild Mountain embarked on this environmental endeavor just started this past summer.

"It is incredibly important to us because we are part of the outdoor industry," Yasis said. "We live and breathe the outdoors."

And it's also important to skiers like Anthony Jones.

"It actually makes me prone to come here more often knowing that they're helping out the environment," Jones said.

Wild Mountain is also working on other environmental initiatives, like selling ecofriendly shirts and hoodies made from recycled fabric, which uses 10-times less water and fossil fuels to create.

"I think that's going to help them business-wise," Jones said. "I think a lot of people have been looking for businesses to kind of take action."

The ski area is also working to eliminate all single-use plastics by this September, among other things.

"We're working with Xcel Energy to purchase wind credits and solar energy credits," Yasis said.

Wild Mountain has also started converting all of their lights over to the more energy-efficient LED lights, which will be used during night skiing. They are also asking the community to help out by bringing refillable water bottles, and carpooling to the park when possible.