Administrators are considering a proposal to reduce the College’s dependence on coal by purchasing “green credits” from the local power provider, Oberlin Municipal Light and Power.
The proposal, drafted by the Environmental Policy Advisory Committee, recommends that the administration strengthen energy conservation efforts on campus, and use the savings to buy the green credits at a premium.
According to Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies John Petersen, a member of EPAC, green power would cost about $25,000 annually, in addition to the approximately one million dollars that the college annually spends on electricity. Seventeen percent of OMLPS’ energy comes from green sources, the attributes of which would be included in the proposed purchase.
“We have two sources,” director of OMLPS Steve Dupee said. “One is hydroelectricity and the other source is landfill gas. Currently, OMLPS sells the premiums to a national energy broker, Green Mountain Energy, and so although some of the electrons used to power campus come from green sources, their status as ‘green’ cannot be claimed locally.”
“Essentially when Oberlin Municipal Light and Power sold the green credits, someone who is purchasing power from Green Mountain Power is really using Oberlin’s green attributes,” Petersen added. “What that means is Oberlin can no longer claim to have those attributes. So, we went from having 83 percent coal power to having much greater than 90 percent green power because we can’t claim those credits. We’ve sold the right to claim those credits.”
Vice President for Finance Andy Evans supports the proposal, but stressed the complexity of the issue.
“The real issue for me was I had to understand where those credits actually reside,” he said. “We do want to do it, but we just want to make sure that whatever we do, it has integrity, and understanding green credits takes a very long time,” he said.
Junior environmental studies major Michael Murray explained the faith involved in buying green credits.
“When you purchase energy, you don’t purchase energy being delivered to your house, you purchase energy being put on the grid,” he said. “That’s a big difference that’s very confusing. You can’t tell where the electrons that are coming out of the outlet in your house come from,” Murray said.
There is some controversy over when a renewable resource is “green” enough to receive credit.
“There are different qualities of green power,” Petersen explained. “Hydroelectric power doesn’t exactly have a pristine record when it comes to the environment. [But] you have to see it in the context of coal versus hydropower.”
The current economic situation, he says, makes this proposal a hard sell.
“We’re getting the same amount of energy for $25,000 dollars more,” he said. “If I’m challenged on that, especially in the context of a budget crisis, I want make sure this has integrity.”
EPAC made a conscious decision, according to Petersen, to build in funding for this proposal through conservation efforts on campus.
“When we were drafting this proposal, I think it was important for all of us that the money for doing this somehow be linked with specific energy savings,” he said. “One reason is Oberlin College is in a budget crisis right now, Oberlin College has laid people off. So, to think about this proposal as competing with jobs was important for us to avoid completely.”
Another benefit to funding the proposal this way, Petersen says, is the exponential effect it has on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Senior EPAC member Claire Jahns agreed.
“This proposal would both reduce our demand for energy, and also change the supply of our electricity,” Jahns said.
Climate Justice, a student group devoted to making Oberlin a climate neutral, zero-emission campus, supports the proposal. Senior member Rebecca Byard believes this proposal has social, economic and environmental benefits.
“The way that power is generated in this region is mostly coal, and it has a lot of negative effects on communities around here,” she said. “Buying these green credits makes a statement.”
Currently, the premiums OMLPS collects from the sale of their green credits are returned to the customer in the form of savings on their energy bill. “It’s very minimal,” Dupee said. “A normal, average household customer sees a savings of about eight cents on their power bill.”
Dupee approached City Council to ask permission to deposit that money into a fund designed to foster further renewable energy projects. “I proposed to our Oberlin city council that instead of passing this back to the customers that we just take this credit and apply it to this sustainable reserve fund, and put it to better use,” Dupee said. The fund would be used for helping to weatherize low-income homes, plant trees in town to capture CO2 and invest in projects to build new renewable energy plants.
For Petersen, the fund is what makes this a unique opportunity for the College. “This is a really novel sort of arrangement we’re talking about here,” he said. “It’s a way of purchasing green power, but keeping a lot of the benefits that often in these sorts of brokered arrangements go far away, keeping them local.”
Jahns sees this proposal as a way for Oberlin to make both a good economic and social choice. “This is a steal, we’re not going to be able to get green energy that cheap from anywhere else,” she said. “And it’s kind of what Oberlin’s all about in terms of taking an important issue that is a social issue as well as a scientific and environmental issue.”
The fate of the proposal now lies in the hands of the administration. “We have sent a proposal to Nancy Dye, letters of the endorsement for that proposal have come from the City Council and Oberlin Municipal Light and Power and I think at this point its really in their hands as to what happens,” Petersen said.
Some students are disappointed in the time it is taking the administration to make a decision.
“Climate Justice is in support of this and we thought the administration was really for it because they seemed like they were, but they’ve been stalling, and it’s been kind of pushed aside,” Jahns said.
President Nancy Dye was not available for an interview. According to Evans, she plans to support the proposal. “I’m committed to it, it’s just finding the money,” Evans said. “And the President’s committed too. We are going to do it,’ he said.