(no subject)
Jul. 2nd, 2008 02:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
inahandbasketI'm a bit of a green energy freak, I've tried to keep it quiet though. (What would the neighbors think?) I suspect that since we own our own place and I now have the ability to affect such changes, I'll be a lot less quiet on that front in the future, just fyi. If you want to opt-out of such lefty communist rantings just let me know and I'll make a filter for it.
I just signed up for NStar electric and gas service at the new house (!) and noticed that they have a full 100% wind power option available for only 1.5 cents per kwh over their standard service. ($.14/kwh instead of $.125). Total no brainer in my mind.
If you're an NStar customer with an account in good standing you can have them switch you over to full wind power. Clicky.
Step one towards full eco-friendly housing complete.
(And in 4 years when our water heater needs replacing we're totally getting an on-demand heater, but that'll be another post.)
I just signed up for NStar electric and gas service at the new house (!) and noticed that they have a full 100% wind power option available for only 1.5 cents per kwh over their standard service. ($.14/kwh instead of $.125). Total no brainer in my mind.
If you're an NStar customer with an account in good standing you can have them switch you over to full wind power. Clicky.
Step one towards full eco-friendly housing complete.
(And in 4 years when our water heater needs replacing we're totally getting an on-demand heater, but that'll be another post.)
no subject
Date: 2008-07-02 10:30 pm (UTC)http://www.bostonherald.com/business/general/view.bg?articleid=1103877
To some extent the entire electrical grid is a bit of a shell game. There's no way to guarantee the origin of your electrons as the entire thing across the country is tied together. Power generators (coal/nuke/wind/solar/wave/hamster) tap into the grid lines not very differently than your house does, but they're pushing into the grid instead of pulling. If you install solar panels on your roof and tie into the grid, you can actually push into it as well (depending on the setup) just as if you were a miniature 3-mile island. So even if you're paying for coal power, some of your electrons might be coming from your neighbor with the solar panels on the roof.
What you're doing by paying a bit extra for wind is mostly supporting their choice by subsidizing the increased distribution and implementation costs (wind is actually still slightly more costly than coal, mostly due to the cost of implementing new technologies versus old established ones (explained a bit here)), and also giving them customer counts to wave for the legislature for future additions to the grid.