Nicholas School Purchases Renewable Energy Certificates to Offset Fossil Fuel Use
"Buying these certificates is a way of putting our money where our mouth is," says William H. Schlesinger
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
Durham, N.C. -- As part of its commitment to environmental stewardship, the
Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke
University has purchased $19,718 of renewable energy certificates
to offset its use of electricity generated from fossil fuels.
“Buying these certificates is a way of putting our money where our mouth is,” said William H. Schlesinger, James B. Duke Professor of Biogeochemistry and dean of the NicholasSchool. “It ensures that the energy our school takes from the national power grid to run classrooms, labs and offices is being replaced with an equivalent amount of clean, renewable energy.”
The school bought the certificates this summer from Gray County Wind Farm, the largest wind farm in Kansas.
Renewable energy certificates are credits that individuals, institutions or businesses can buy to compensate for the amount of nonrenewable, greenhouse gas-emitting fossil fuels they burn in their vehicles, homes, offices or other facilities.
Buying the certificates helps subsidize the cost for a wind farm, solar farm or other renewable energy producer to generate an equivalent amount of clean energy and put it back into the national power grid, Schlesinger explained. But you’re not buying the energy itself; you’re buying the attributes of the energy.
“The certificates represent the desirable environmental outcomes, such as reduced carbon dioxide emissions, that are achieved when the energy is produced using renewable energy sources instead of fossil fuels,” he said.
“It sounds complex, but the bottom line for most energy users is pretty simple: Buying these certificates is an easy way to offset the amount of greenhouse gas emissions their energy use has caused.”
The NicholasSchool’s purchase of the wind power certificates compensates for the estimated amount of electricity used last year at the school’s facilities in Durham and at the Duke University Marine Laboratory in Beaufort, N.C.
“All told, we’re offsetting about 16.5 million pounds of carbon dioxide emissions,” said Becca Ryals, a second-year Master of Environmental Management student who worked with school administrators, staff members and student groups to spearhead the purchase. “That’s equivalent to taking about 1,500 gas-powered cars off the road for a year.”
Ryals said the idea to buy the certificates grew, in part, out of Nicholas School students’ involvement in the Duke University Greening Initiative (DUGI), a project aimed at enhancing environmental sustainability campuswide. After conducting a survey this summer that showed 92 percent of Nicholas School students supported the purchase of renewable energy certificates from the school’s discretionary fund, Ryals and other students from DUGI, the Nicholas School Student Advisory Committee and the Energy Club met with Schlesinger and school staff members to suggest the purchase.
“The dean, the staff and the students all agreed that purchasing this energy should be a high priority for a school of the environment,” Ryals said, “but we didn’t want it to cut into funds earmarked for scholarships, research or other priorities.”
The school was able to secure an attractive rate by taking advantage of an existing agreement negotiated by Duke University Procurement Services with Sterling Planet, an Atlanta-based energy broker that markets renewable energy from Gray County Wind Farm and other energy producers. Under the confidential terms of the agreement, the Nicholas School got the same rate Procurement Services negotiated earlier this year for the new Center for Interdisciplinary Engineering, Medicine and Applied Sciences at Duke’s Pratt School of Engineering.
Ryals said students plan to install a display about renewable energy in the school’s Hug Commons this fall to promote awareness of the purchase and encourage greater energy conservation and efficiency throughout the school.
“As a community and as individuals, we have an opportunity -- and a responsibility -- to help slow global warming,” she said.