Several of Indiana’s major employers and biggest cities are not happy with their energy options — they want more, and they want it cleaner.
That desire has prompted companies such Salesforce, Roche, Cummins and more to call on their utility providers to make it easier to get green power.
These companies, along with the cities of Indianapolis and Bloomington, wrote a letter to Duke Energy and AES Indiana formally requesting the utilities offer more options for large customers to source their electricity from renewable energy. More specifically, they want what’s often called a Green Tariff.
The tariff would let these cities and companies buy power produced from renewable energy that is locally produced. With that, this program would let the companies run with their goals to go green and meet sustainability targets.
“There is strong customer demand for clean energy in Indiana,” said Caryl Auslander, executive director of Advanced Energy United. United is a national association of businesses working to accelerate the transition to clean energy.
“Many corporations, cities and institutions in Indiana have clean energy goals, and they are dependent on Indiana’s utilities, like Duke and AES, to get their energy,” Auslander said in a statement. Large customers “want to choose renewable energy, and we’re asking Duke and AES to give them more options.”
Both utilities currently offer green pricing programs for residential as well as business customers: Go Green for Duke and Green Power for AES Indiana. With these programs, customers pay a premium as an extra charge on their electricity bill to be put toward renewable energy sources in the Midwest.
Depending on the utility and how much energy is used, the average residential customer can expect to pay between $2 to more than $10 on top of their regular bill in a given month. But for large customers that use a lot of energy, that sort of program is not what they’re looking for.
A green tariff program, on the other hand, lets these big companies and cities have a long-term agreement to have some or all of their electricity come from renewable energy projects — and often for a lower price.
Coca-Cola has committed to reducing carbon emissions 25% by 2030, and one of its bottlers has signed onto the letter. How the corporation powers its bottling facility plays a big part in meeting this target.Not only could a green tariff program help meet sustainability targets, Marty said, but it could help Coca-Cola stabilize its energy costs over the long-term. The other signatories — Cummins, Walmart, Salesforce, Rivian and Roche — feel the same. These companies want lower and less volatile costs that come with renewable technologies.
So do the cities of Indianapolis and Bloomington.
Instead of paying on top of their current bill, the tariff program would let the companies and cities lock in a new rate that pays directly for the cost of electricity from the wind or solar farm. The renewable projects could be owned by the utility or contracted with independent producers within the local grid.
It also opens up the opportunity for building new green energy projects in the state to support the demand and to keep that growth in Indiana.
Such large-scale projects have faced serious opposition in Indiana — more than 30 counties in Indiana have passed ordinances that restrict, if not outright prohibit, wind and solar projects. The state passed a law last year to create some consistent standards and encourage counties to open their doors to large renewable projects.
The letter is quick to point out that utilities in more than 15 other states have established green tariffs, including Arizona, Georgia, Kentucky, Michigan, Nebraska, North Carolina, Virginia, Wisconsin and Wyoming.
Both AES Indiana and Duke reference their existing green power options that are available to customers, but also told IndyStar they already are exploring ideas about other renewable offerings.
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