All power to you...What is the best source of power


This is something that has really been bugging me, and I haven't any answers yet, in fact, I feel like there are so many answers out there that I am overwhelmed by them. What I am talking about is, what is the best source of power. My first choice would be to have our own solar panels to provide us with sufficient power for our needs. After that, what is next and how do we choice the right provider? All providers seem to say that they are providing renewable energy. But are they really? And how much are they?
The Green Power site (which is a government website) provides all of the information about, how to "buy in" to the green power, either as a home or as a business. As a Green Power user you can choose how much green power you would like to buy (between 10-100% of your electricity account) and this will then be offset by GreenPower. Obviously, the more you buy, the better for the environment.
There are labels with different percentage amounts help you to work out what you are happy to "buy into". This is the percentage of your household’s electricity consumption your accredited GreenPower your energy retailer is buying on your behalf that will be renewable energy.
ie. You choose 10% GreenPower you can offset 10% of your household’s electricity consumption with renewable energy. This 10% is added then to Australia’s electricity grids. The more people who choose to buy GreenPower the more renewable energy Australia can produce.
If you live in Victoria, you could go to this page and find all of the retailers who supply GreenPower. When you then click on their logo, it will then take you to their website where you will be able to see the different percentage choices that they have on offer. They have listings for every state in Australia. I suspect that other countries may have something similar?
The green power comes from sources like mini hydro, wind power and biomass which produce no net greenhouse gas emissions.
But, what is the cost? Well, I am not exactly sure about this. The GreenPower site tells me, and I quote "the few cents extra you pay in addition to your electricity account each day is invested in the renewable energy sector." I suspect that each energy company charges their own thing...so investigation is going to be key. Watch this space!
So, now I just have to look at the choices between AGL, CountryEnergy, SimplyEnergy, Australian Power&Gas, Jackgreen, powerdirect, EnergyAustralia, Red Energy, Origin, Momentum, energy, neighbourhood energy, Victoria electricity, TRU energy....shouldn't be too hard ;)
Does this help?

2 comments:

  1. Its a very interesting discussion. We are waiting to have our solar power installed with the government rebate.
    I haven't looked into the Green Power options in depth, I suppose I should. I would like a lot more information. For instance, where are these wind-, hydro-, biogas- etc. facilities located? I'm not aware of any so-called green installations in our area. So am I really going to get what I would be paying for? And if the installations are not local, what is the cost of getting that power to me? Financially and environmentally? Or would I just be paying for some green power to get fed into the grid somewhere but in fact I would still be receiving coal-fired electricity at my location? Should I then feel that at least I am contributing to some overall solution?
    So as you can see, I have a lot more questions than answers. But thanks for putting this topic out for us to think about.

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  2. I agree Joanne because when I started looking into it, it appears that it is not as idealist as I would have liked it. The reality is that we would be paying for the green power to be fed into the grid. The more people that do it, the less we (the collective we) rely on coal-fired electricity. So I guess, being an idealist, we should all have solar panels, and choose 100% green energy, so that any electricity that we do have to use is "opting for" green power. The more of us that do that the better overall. The solar power that we are gathering from our roofs, when in excess to our needs, can feed into the grid too. Yes, lots of questions - it's a difficult process to work through. Thanks Joanne

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