How to Sign up for Green Energy in DC if your Utility Company is Pepco: Commerical Edition

Steps:

1. Know your options. DC has several companies that offer 100% wind and/or solar plans. They are:

• Agera Energy
• CleanChoice Energy
• Groundswell
• NRG
• WGL Energy

2. Ask your property manager if they have contacts with anyone at one of the above-listed companies and have them get a quote. The property manager may get the best quote due to their position and contacts.

3. If possible, to get more quotes, obtain a copy of a few of the building’s electricity bills from the property manager. Determine the total kWh per year, and contact the companies listed above to research available plans. Get pricing for each plan. Rates depend on the amount of energy used (ie: the total kWh per year).

4. Compare pricing. The wind/solar energy replace the Transmission Charges on your PEPCO bill, so add up the total kWh unit price on the Transmission Charges and compare it to the kWh unit price in each green energy plan.

5. Choose a plan and sign up.

FYI/Answers to FAQs:

• Pepco will still be your utility.
• There will not be an interruption to your service, because wind and solar are in larger supply than demand. There are many wind farms and solar farms with which companies contract, so there is always wind or solar available for companies to purchase and supply to your home.
• The building’s electricity currently comes from DC’s default fuel mix (coal 34.26%, nuclear 34.70%, natural gas 26.34%, oil 0.20%, and renewables 4.46% according to the DC Public Service Commission’s most recent Report on Fuel Mix). Switching to wind or solar energy simply means the building purchases 100% of its energy from wind and/or solar.
• Switching to wind or solar energy is an investment in wind or solar technology. Eventually wind and solar will be the least expensive energy options for everyone everywhere. Purchasing wind or solar now makes that shift happen faster.
• Widespread use of wind or solar energy (1) significantly mitigates climate change and (2) makes mountaintop removal to mine coal in Appalachia, fracking, and oil pipelines that threaten livelihoods literally become things of the past, and (3) mitigates wars fought for oil — and thus all the horrors that come with war. The lessening of suffering that independent, renewable energy leads to is quite simply phenomenal.