City of Palo Alto's Green Energy Program #1 in Country

11. January 2008
ERSOL NEWS
City of Palo Alto's Green Energy Program #1 in Country

Aktuelle Nachrichten - veröffentlicht durch ad-hoc-news.de: The City of
Palo Alto recently celebrated its ranking as the number one renewable
energy program in the U.S., according to the National Renewable Energy
Laboratory (NREL). PaloAltoGreen, a voluntary green energy purchasing
program, now boasts a membership of one in five ratepayers. While the
national average for enrollment in similar programs is less than two
percent, PaloAltoGreen saw a five percent membership increase in 2007.

The City of Palo Alto, a leading member of the Northern California Power
Agency (NCPA), launched PaloAltoGreen five years ago. For an additional 1.5
cents per kilowatt hour (kWh), community ratepayers can volunteer to enroll
in the green energy program. Annually, the City’s utility department
purchases nearly 41.5 million kWh of clean energy, which offsets
approximately 700 million pounds of harmful carbon dioxide.

“The City of Palo Alto is a leading example of the benefits of municipal
utilities participating in green energy programs,” said Jim Pope, general
manager of NCPA.

Renewable energy public-private partnerships enable municipal utilities to
offer the type of smart green energy pricing programs that ratepayers more
often respond to -- and more importantly -- are enormously effective in
reducing CO2 emissions.

The city estimates that the average additional residential monthly expense
to ratepayers in the program is less than ten dollars a month to purchase
100 percent renewable energy. With the city’ emphasis on providing
sustainable, reliable, and affordable electric power service, the
participants in PaloAltoGreen, even after paying this premium, still pay
less than the Pacific Gas & Electric Company standard rate.

Combining green energy purchasing policies with a simple enrollment plan,
PaloAltoGreen demonstrates that increasing renewable energy usage and
reducing greenhouse gas emissions can be economic and practical when the
public and private sectors work together. The clean energy program attracts
participation from business as well, with more than 100 local businesses
participating in PaloAltoGreen.

PaloAltoGreen purchases a California blend of renewable energy from wind
and solar generators in Davis, Pleasanton, San Ramon and Solano County.
97.5 percent of it is from wind with the remaining 2.5 percent from solar.

NREL, which is the nation's primary laboratory for renewable energy and
energy efficiency research and development, releases “Top-10" rankings of
the nation’s best performing renewable energy programs annually.
NCPA is a nonprofit California joint powers agency established in 1968 to
generate, transmit, and distribute electric power to and on behalf of its
fifteen members: the Cities of Alameda, Biggs, Gridley, Healdsburg, Lodi,
Lompoc, Palo Alto, Redding, Roseville, Santa Clara, and Ukiah; the San
Francisco Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), the Port of Oakland, the Truckee
Donner Public Utility District, and the Turlock Irrigation District; and
two associate members: the Placer County Water Agency and the Plumas-Sierra
Rural Electric Cooperative, serving nearly 700,000 electric consumers in
Central and Northern California. For more information, please visit
www.ncpa.com.