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Buy Clean Energy!
Why Buy Clean Renewable Energy?
Our faiths instruct us to be good stewards of the creation – to till it and keep it for the God who gives us life. But our use of energy is polluting the air and altering the very climate that sustains life on earth. About 40% of America’s air pollution comes from the production of electricity. In this region, burning coal provides roughly half of our power. Another third of our power comes from nuclear energy. Little of our power comes from clean renewable energy sources like wind turbines, solar panels and landfill gas.
VIPL provides several ways for congregations and individuals to make a real difference by instead purchasing their energy from clean renewable sources, all at a cost of only a few dollars a month. If you commit just a portion of what you save through the energy conservation and efficiency measures you will find at our Save Energy & Money page, your will easily cover this cost, help the environment even more, and still save money.
How and Where Can I Purchase and Support the Development of Clean Energy?
First, while in many states it is possible to purchase renewable energy options directly through your electric utility provider, unfortunately in
Virginia
this is not yet the case. VIPL, together with a number of other groups, is working for the public policy changes needed to make this possible. Your support of VIPL helps move toward this goal. We hope you and your faith community will join us in these vital efforts. To learn more about how you can do so go to our Public Policy Advocacy page.
Second, while Virginians at the present time are not able to purchase renewable energy through their electric utility provider, they can purchase Tradable Renewable Energy Certificates (TRCs), also known as “green tags”. By purchasing these independently verified certificates you insure that somewhere in the grid an equivalent amount of clean renewable energy is produced which displaces and compensates for the amount of energy you use from your regular electric provider. While many sources for TRECs are available, the link below to Native Energy Wind Builders is especially helpful and easy to use.
Native Energy Wind Builders
Third, Carbonfund.org provides a simple low cost way to purchase both energy and carbon reduction certificates to compensate for your global warming footprint. They also provide an easy to use and informative calculator to determine the environmental impact of all the forms of energy you currently use. Click the link below for details.
Fourth, this link to the U.S. Department of Energy’s Green Power Network website provides continuously updated information about all of the renewable energy options available nationally and in each state, as well as links to learn more and purchase renewable energy certificates from any of these many providers.
And this link to the Union of Concerned Scientists web page gives an overview of renewable energy basics.
Union of Concerned Scientists
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