First Solar works hard to avoid, minimize and mitigate environmental impacts from its solar power projects, in line with its mission to generate energy in a sustainable way. Case in point: the 550-megawatt Topaz Solar Farms project that the company is building in San Luis Obispo County, Calif. for MidAmerican Solar. First Solar developers collaborated with public resource agencies and with national and local environmental organizations on a plan that will preserve in perpetuity 22,000 acres of the Carrizo Plain as habitat for species such as the San Joaquin kit fox, pronghorn antelope and tule elk.

Tired but satisfied volunteers caught their breath and cooled off, sitting on the lowered gate of a semi-trailer backed up to the loading dock at First Solar’s Tempe, Arizona, headquarters. It took all morning to load by hand, but the truck now held 8,675 boxes of macaroni & cheese, 3,573 cans of tuna and 1,186 jars of peanut butter – a 15,018 pound load translating to 11,552 meals.