If you could buy clean, renewable energy from your utility, would you? And how much cost increase is too much?
December 25, 2009
There are many utilities in the USA that now offer you the option to buy clean, renewable energy from Wind, Solar, Geothermal and Biomass instead of the normal Coal, Nuclear, Natural Gas, Hydro and Petroleum. If you had this option, would you choose it? Why or why not? And how much is to much of an increase for it?
I signed up for wind power and paid 2 or 3 cents/KWh more than the local utility company. It’s only a few dollars a month more, and I’m locked in to that price for a year so if rates rise, I’m protected at least through the 12 months.
Even if the physical electrons from the windmill are not carried directly to my house, the willingness of myself and others to pay more for cleaner energy shows the power companies that a demand is there. If they want to profit from it, they will fill the demand. Some power companies will stick their head in the sand and continue business as usual and fight the changing times. The auto industry comes to mind. Detroit can’t make a profit these days because of fighting innovation & demand for a better product for decades. It will be the same fate for oil and electric companies that don’t move forward into the 21st century.
I’m so confused i really don’t know. Problem is now money is considered a form of GLOBAL WARMING cause the new bills are "hard to recycle"…… U all think we may be getting just a LITTLE carried away with this?!?!
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It is and I do. It costs $0.025/kWh additional. Obviously that is not too much for me, but it probably would be for some.
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I live in California where the power grid is already one of the most environmentally friendly in the USA, and our power bills aren’t any higher than the average because we’re also more energy efficient than other states.
If I lived elsewhere, I would absolutely pay more for renewable energy. I’d probably be willing to pay twice as much, since I don’t use a lot of electricity anyway. I’d have a hard time with my conscience if I was getting cheap electricity from coal-burning and heavy CO2 emitting power plants.
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I would conditionaly. Right now I’m sceptical that my extra money is actualy being used for green technology. Aside from not clearly understanding how wind turbines 200 miles away come to "me" and not my neighbor because I pay for green, I also want to know those extra nickles aren’t going to be used for clean but not renewable power such as the so called clean-coal burning plants. And why exactly should we pay more? Shouldn’t we be demanding they phase in better power systems?
So I guess, no I wouldn’t, at least not untill other areas of my life are inline. But I would like to support increased rebate programs and rate cuts for people who efficientize their homes or invest in supporting sources of power/water. Heck I’d like to see garbage/recycling pickup fees reduced or ommitted for those who compost their food and have little to no trash…
Yeah I wandered off topic there sorry…
CS
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Excuse me?? Hydro is a renewable energy source. Bio-mas is just like Natural Gas, except you are burning methane instead and producing it from manure(cow, pig, chicken) but both produce the same dirty carcinogens.
You got to separate the words clean and renewable. Yes solar, wind, geo, and hydro produce both clean AND renewable energy. Where as substitutions like corn oil for petroleum produce the same emissions only that corn oil is a renewable source.
Also most of the ones you mentioned above are electricity producers, the problem with electricity is that it become more expensive to transport the farther the distance is from the source to the end user. After a certain distance those sources cannot produce the amounts needed just for the transportation alone. If that was not the case, we would already have had the entire south west deserts covered with solar panels but unfortunately that is not the case. The issue is not that if we can add 10 or 20 extra dollars to the utility bills its if it can be done at all. For the moment, unless you can live with a wind turbine in your back yard, the answer is no for the most of us.
Lastly, solar and wind, though renewable, they are not constant. We do not have a sufficient battery storage technology to keep us going through out the night or when the wind doesn’t blow. I won’t not pin my hopes on them too much, though they are a help, they are not the solution, at least not yet.
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the "clean energy" programs where you pay more and they guarantee that your energy is not made with fossil fuels are scams.
First of all… they have already built the alternative plant to make the electricity with the alternative method.
Second… all they do is say your energy came from the alternative production… and then the people who don’t pay for the alternative are getting all of the fossil fuel energy…
But the electric lines are the same… and there is no way that they can separate which electrons go where.
If they have more people who pay for the alternative power than they can supply… they will never tell you. They’ll just let you use whatever electricity happens to be on the power grid.
Sorry. But that’s reality.
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Envirowacko idiots will pay extra to feel good… even if it doesn’t really do any good.
I live in NW Indiana and my utility bills run $300/month. We don’t have an option for clean energy. My family in TN pays about $120 a month. So, if I were to move somewhere where utilities are cheaper, I would pay up to the same that I pay now to get clean energy. Anything above $350 a month starts getting difficult though.
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I signed up for wind power and paid 2 or 3 cents/KWh more than the local utility company. It’s only a few dollars a month more, and I’m locked in to that price for a year so if rates rise, I’m protected at least through the 12 months.
Even if the physical electrons from the windmill are not carried directly to my house, the willingness of myself and others to pay more for cleaner energy shows the power companies that a demand is there. If they want to profit from it, they will fill the demand. Some power companies will stick their head in the sand and continue business as usual and fight the changing times. The auto industry comes to mind. Detroit can’t make a profit these days because of fighting innovation & demand for a better product for decades. It will be the same fate for oil and electric companies that don’t move forward into the 21st century.
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