12. US Green Power weak but could grow

A report from the US Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) gives green power programmes in the U.S. a mixed review. The report praises the 85 utilities in 29 states that have designed green power programs, resulting in 282 megawatts of new renewable capacity installed or planned. But the current customer participation rate of less than 1% in more than half of green power programmes points to faulty marketing, NREL says. And the report laments that only a dozen or so of those 85 utilities have developed more than two megawatts of new renewable power. Pricing of green power, NREL concludes, should be directly tied to the investment promised for new projects. Utilities should give their green power programs greater visibility in advertising and Internet-based campaigns. They should find ways to include businesses and other non-residential customers in their programs. And green power programs should also continually seek to make customer participation in the program easy and valuable, for example, by lowering the extra premiums when warranted, or protecting participants from fossil-fuel-generated rate increases.

The study showed some customers will ‘go green’ even if the price is higher than conventional sources. "Market research consistently shows that consumers prefer to receive their power from clean energy sources ... giving consumers energy supply choices can be a powerful mechanism for moving renewable energy into the marketplace", said Blair Swezey, co-author of the study. And a proper green pricing programme could boost use of cleaner electricity sources by 40% by the end of the decade, regardless of whether the market is deregulated.

* Non-hydro renewables provide about 2%, or 16,500 megawatts (MW), of all the electricity used in the United States. Hydropower provides about 10%. With the expansion of customer choice, the study found the market could support about 6,000 MW of additional non-hydro renewables over the next decade.

The report is at: www.eren.doe.gov/greenpower/29831.pdf

PV for US consumers

The energy crisis in California has led to renewed interest by consumers in generating their own power. Green Mountain Energy, which resells wind, solar, geothermal, natural gas and biomass-generated energy to consumers, has also now created three different solar photovoltaic packages for consumers to install direct - generating up to 1, 2 or 4 kilowatts of electricity- for home and small business installations.

According to Green Mountain, the systems, manufactured by BP Solar and ranging in price from $7,000 - $22,000, should pay for themselves within 10 years, and can ‘help California consumers achieve smaller, even nonexistent, electricity bills’.

Green Mountain has calculated that a 2 kW system will ‘easily generate 50% of the average home’s electricity needs’. The California Energy Commission has seen interest in solar systems surge over the last two years, with a 500% jump in applications for a rebate that offsets up to 50% of installation costs.