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What Makes a Bad Green Pricing Program?
December 2005
By Sheila Townsend
CRES Executive Director
Green Power Partners run by United Power in Adams County could
probably not be certified by an independent organization such as
Green-e. Furthermore, the company’s claims for this program mislead
the public.
United Power the company charges its participating customers $0.025
per kWh for what it calls “wind power” from Wyoming in Green Power
Partners.
http://www.unitedpower.com/greenpower.htm
But the company is a distributor of electricity and doesn’t generate
any power of its own. It purchases all of its electricity from
Tri-State G&T in Westminster, including Tri-State’s renewable
program. Unfortunately, Tri-State’s renewable program consists
mostly of electricity purchased from hydroelectric facilities in
southwest Colorado.
http://www.tristategt.org/greenpower/program.cfm
Most of the reservoirs selling power to Tri-State are operated by
local water conservancy districts, and a couple of small power
stations are owned by individuals.
Vallecito Dam near Bayfield in southwest Colorado; rated at 5,224
kW; power station constructed in 1989. The dam was originally
constructed by the Bureau of Reclamation in 1941.
Lemon Dam also near Bayfield, Colo.; rated at 76 kW; constructed in
1961.
Plus an additional 892 kW of capacity located in four reservoirs in
southwest Colorado.
Tri-State claims it purchases 153,000 kWh a month from the Platte
River Power Authority’s Medicine Bow wind power project. This is
about one-half of the output of a single wind turbine in Lamar. Wind
therefore accounts for less than 10% of the capacity of Tri-State’s
green power program. And using Tri-State’s capacity factors, wind
accounts for less than 7% of the kilowatt-hours sold through the
program.
The problem isn’t with Tri-State. That company is very clear that
it’s mission is coal-fired power generation. The company operates
1,815 megawatts of power in Colorado, and 99.3% of this is from
coal; 0.5% from an oil-fired station; 0.2% from a natural gas plant.
The company owns no renewable power generation. Its so-called green
purchases disappear into the lower decimal places of its
percentages.
If you do a media search on Tri-State you will read a series of
articles about the benefits of coal-fired power generation.
Naturally they neglect the emissions from coal, which make the
company one of the top industrial polluters in the state.
Annual emissions include:
13,000 tons of sulfur dioxide.
25,000 tons of nitrogen oxides.
300 tons of airborne mercury
Tri-State’s Web site is very critical of wind and renewable energy
in general. Perhaps this is ironic, given they appear to want to
sell a green product. I’m not sure why anyone would want to pay them
extra for electricity that is mostly generated from large
hydroelectric facilities that were built a long time ago.
Green power is mean to develop new power generation from renewable
technologies that are in the early stages of technical development.
They are meant to support renewable power projects in nearby
communities so that the economic development that comes from the
jobs benefit those communities. Compare Tri-State’s approach with
Green-e’s accreditation criteria for Colorado, which was developed
with input from CRES members (PDF 156 KB).
http://www.green-e.org/pdf/baCO801.pdf
When United Power does business with Tri-State, it is distributing
electricity generated from coal. According to its own website, the
Green Power Partners contains less than 10% renewable energy that
can be certified.
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