Gurnee Chipotle Goes Green

By Marcus Gilmer in Food on Oct 14, 2008 8:20PM

Last fall, we mentioned a new Chipotle restaurant in Gurnee that was going to feature a wind turbine. The restaurant is now open for business and the new location (6040 Gurnee Mills Blvd East) features a six-kilowatt wind turbine that generates up to 10 percent of the restaurant's power. It's part of a LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) for Retail Pilot being run by the U.S. Green Building Council. The Gurnee location also has these "green" features:

• use of recycled drywall, recycled barn metal, and primers and paints that contain fewer chemicals;
  
• a variety of energy and water conservation elements inside the restaurant, including LED lighting, highly efficient faucets and toilets, and Energy Star rated kitchen equipment;
  
• a 2,500 gallon underground water cistern that will harvest rainwater to irrigate the landscape;
  
• native plants outside that will require less watering and fertilizer;
  
• and asphalt in the parking lot that will reflect the sun's heat, rather than absorb it, making the entire site cooler.

The power generated by the turbine will be minimal since Gurnee's distance from Lake Michigan will prevent it from taking full advantage of those gentle lake breezes we here in the city so enjoy (especially in February). Still, it's more than most restaurants are doing, so we salute you Chipotle, maker of White People Food.

And just because we're feeling juvenile at the Chicagoist office today, alternate headlines for this post included:

Chipotle: Now Breaking Wind So You Don't Have To
Chipotle: Recycling In A Whole New Way
Local Chipotle To Use Wind Energy And Not Your Natural Gas
Gurnee Becomes New 'Windy City'

Chipotle Green Building Rendering via the Chipotle Website