Earth Day April 22nd

In celebration of Earth Day, maybe each of us could do something good for the planet.

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As time permits, I'll post some ideas about reducing energy costs, reducing trash or even planting trees.

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In the meantime, this article about Gainesville, Florida in Southern Studies defines what a municipal utility can accomplish with a change of mindset --

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When the municipal utility in Gainesville, Fla. began holding public meetings to discuss how to provide for its future energy needs, one man in the audience kept getting up to talk about the solar boom in Germany -- a country that gets about as much sunshine as Juneau, Alaska. Eventually Ed Regan, the man in charge of strategic planning for Gainesville Regional Utilities, decided he had to travel to Germany to see for himself what was going on.

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Why is the renewable energy market in Gainesville booming while it's collapsing elsewhere in the country? The answer boils down to policy. In early February, the city became the first in the nation to adopt a "feed-in tariff" -- a clunky and un-descriptive name for a bold incentive to foster renewable energy. Under this system, the local power company is required to buy renewable energy from independent producers, no matter how small, at rates slightly higher than the average cost of production. This means anyone with a cluster of solar cells on their roof can sell the power they produce at a profit. The costs of the program are passed on to ratepayers, who see a small rise in their electric bills (in Gainesville the annual increase is capped at 1 percent). While rate hikes are seldom popular, the community has rallied behind this policy, because unlike big power plant construction -- the costs of which are also passed on to the public -- everyone has the opportunity to profit, either by investing themselves or by tapping into the groundswell of economic activity the incentive creates.