The amount of “green power” sold by the country’s utilities rose by 34 percent in 2008, according to a report from the National Renewable Energy Laboratory released last month.
But this type of power — representing less than 1 percent of the nation’s total electricity consumption, and most of it coming from wind turbines — is still more expensive than conventional power, half of which is generated by coal plants.
Homeowners signing up for green power programs — that is, programs where a power company allows consumers to specify that they want their electricity to come from green sources — pay an extra 1.8 cents a kilowatt-hour on average.
Taking account of the amount of power American households typically use, that translates to
nearly $1,700 more a year.
The nation’s largest green-power program has seen enrollment fall far short of expectations as its wind power prices have soared.
Austin Energy, which offers homeowners and businesses the chance to power their homes with renewable energy (mainly wind) through its GreenChoice program, has signed up only 1 percent of its hoped-for customers for its latest wind power offering, according to The Austin American Statesman.
Buying wind power now costs substantially more than conventional power (which has recently fallen in price as natural gas prices have plunged), and Austin Energy may be forced to spread the cost among all of its customers, according to the paper.
Since early 2008, the utility’s wind power prices have almost doubled for customers who want to lock in the price for 10 years, and Austin Energy plans to add a large and costly solar array as well. Ed Clark, a spokesman for Austin Energy, told Green Inc. that the main problem was Texas’s congested transmission lines.
ReEnergize Texas, a youth coalition pushing for measures to address climate change, advocates for “green fees” on campus.
College students often protest when administrators threaten to raise their fees.
But rising numbers of students seem willing to self-impose a “green” fee, to help the environment and purchase renewable energy. The Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education posts a list of universities that have such fees, which generally hover around $3 to $5 a semester but have increased to $40 a term in the case of Northland College in Wisconsin.
Portland State University is currently voting on whether to establish this kind of fee.
In some states like Florida and Texas, students at public universities have been foiled in their efforts to impose green fees. That is because any fee increase must be approved by the state legislature. The back-and-forth process can easily take four years, according to Trevor Lovell of ReEnergize Texas, a youth coalition pushing for measures to address climate change — by which time the student body will have (hopefully) turned over.
A bill backed by ReEnergize Texas is working its way through the Texas state legislature that would allow university students to impose green fees more easily.
A similar bill in Florida just failed.
Capital, fuel and operating costs for wind (with and without a production tax credit), compared to scrubbed coal and combined-cycle natural gas. With no fuel costs for wind, rates can be fixed, the authors of a recent article suggest. (Chart: “Public Utilities Fortnightly“)
More than 600,000 homes and businesses around the country have signed up to get their power from renewable energy sources like wind or wood chips.
Such voluntary “green power” programs are offered by around 25 percent of electric utilities (examples include Austin Energy and Puget Sound Energy, and the Department of Energy lists other top programs). Participation rates are generally low — 2 percent on average, largely because wind power is more expensive than buying coal or, in some cases, natural gas.
Analysis of these programs — why people sign up for them and how they are administered — is provided in a recent issue of “Public Utilities Fortnightly,” in a somewhat technical article (PDF) by Lori Bird and Karlynn Cory, both of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and Blair Swezey of Applied Materials, a semiconductor company.
Among the highlights:
* For homeowners, the decisions on whether to buy green power is “emotional,” but for companies, it is generally a business decision.
* Green power may be more expensive for now, but for businesses it offers a key advantage: the ability to predict the price of electricity. The price of natural gas, a key fuel for making electricity, has bounded up and down in recent years. But the wind is free, so utilities are able to provide customers with fixed-rate power.