news piece

[chelidon]

Thought some of my Austin friends might be interested...

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The City of Austin, Texas, has announced it is playing
host to a nationwide competition and the prize is the
title of "Clean Energy Capital of the U.S."

The group Solar Austin pitched the idea of the contest
to the U.S. Department of Energy. The group received a
$45,000 grant to organize and host the contest. Their
website is:

http://www.solaraustin.org

I spoke with Solar Austin Co-Director Jane Pulaski
this morning (04 JAN 06), who told me the "rules" are
still under development by the Union of Concerned
Scientists, but she said they should be available by
the end of January. She promised to let me know whey
they are out, and I'll let this group know.

The contest is entitled, "Energy Freedom Challenge".
It is to be a race to see which city in the U.S. can
be the first to get 50 percent of its energy from
renewable sources like wind, solar, geo-thermal,
methane and biomass power by the year 2025.

Austin reports it now receives 5 percent of its energy
from either wind, solar or landfill methane power;
well short of hitting the 50 percent mark. How is
"your" city doing?

Comments

[swansister.livejournal.com]

This is excellant. I must show this to my Mayor.

Just yesterday we were talking about the mining accident in WV. Subsequently we got to talking about "energy" and the whole coal industry in WV. It is a head shaker for sure.

Thank you for sharing this,

Swansister

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

sho' nuf, my pleasure. We're about to get a huge new wind farm near here, which makes me happy. We also have a power plant which burns all of the sawdust and wood waste from the local sawmills, and a couple of good-sized hydro plants on the Connecticut river. I don't know how much of our local/regional electricity it provides, but with peak oil looming, I'm happy for locally-controlled renewable power production, for sure. I plan to have my own microhydro power production either this year or next, but it would be much easier if we had a good regional source of electricity to fall back on. I am worried, though, about the local (and global) environmental impact if the Midwest U.S. builds a ton of new coal-fired plants, as they are likely to do when oil gets scarce.

[rainysummerday.livejournal.com]

I do my tiny part, I have the "green option" for my city power bill, it costs more but it's worth it to send a message that we want renewable energy. The businesses in Austin are pretty good about using that option but last stats I saw were had only 7% of residential power customers using it so that's lame, hopefully it will change.

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

I used to do that, too, back in Maryland, and I think it's great that they offer it -- it would be better, of course, if more people took advantage of it (yeah, 7% is pretty lame), but it's good that it's there. I'm thinking that as energy costs rise, however, less and less people may choose to (or be able to) do that, which would really be too bad.