The Tennessee Valley Authority has been recognized by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory as a Top 10 utility leader in green power program sales.
In its first NREL Top 10 ranking in a decade, TVA landed at No. 9 nationally with green power sales of 199,067 megawatt-hours in calendar 2013, thanks to TVA’s Renewable Energy Solutions programs and participating local power companies.
On Monday, one of those participating communities – the City of Oak Ridge – was designated as the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency’s first Green Power Community in the Southeast, based in part on TVA green power purchases.
“TVA is proud to be recognized nationally for our strong and growing support of renewable energy,” said Patty West, director of TVA’s Renewable Energy Solutions. “Cost-effective, renewable energy is an important part of TVA’s diverse portfolio of energy-generation sources.”
A key to TVA’s renewable energy sales has been Green Power Switch, which TVA launched on Earth Day 2000 with local power companies and members of the environmental community as the first-of-its-kind renewable power purchase program in the Southeast.
GPS gives consumers and businesses the opportunity to buy 150-kilowatt-hour blocks of renewable energy generated in the Valley from solar, wind and biomass conversation for $4 per block. “Our local power company partners have enthusiastically supported this effort and, through their efforts, more than 12,600 residential and business customers are currently buying GPS energy blocks,” Ms. West said.
The City of Oak Ridge increased its GPS participation from about 500 local customers to more than 800 during a two-month campaign to achieve the EPA Green Power Community designation. That represents more than 5 percent of Oak Ridge’s customers, and the highest rate of any community in the Green Power Switch program.
Since the program began, GPS customers have supported 1,062,260 megawatt-hours of renewable energy in the Tennessee Valley, enough to supply the electricity needs for more than 66,300 average homes in the TVA service area.
For more information about TVA’s Renewable Energy Solutions and to participate in the GPS program, visit http://www.tva.gov/renewable which includes a list of participating local power companies.