THE TWISTING TURBINES on the Columbia River Gorge ridges were one of the first things my husband and I noticed en route from Baltimore to our new house in Oregon.

But it turns out ditching dirty energy is more complicated than that hawker would have me believe. My well-meaning purchase has little to do with those windmills.

Renewable Energy Certificate (United States) - Wikipedia

Instead, Pacific Power hands my Blue Sky money over to companies that buy renewable energy certificates RECs from wind farms, mostly in other states, and other renewable projects like methane-burning landfills.

Experts say that RECs like mine can make renewable projects more profitable, but they play a much smaller role than government subsidies.

Attention Required! | Cloudflare

My father recently invested in a wood-chip-fueled electricity plant in Florida, and he said RECs sweetened that deal. Gillenwater says most projects would have produced the energy regardless of whether consumers like me pitched in—in , for example, Pacific Power bought a third of my RECs from two Puget Sound Energy wind farms built in The remaining two-thirds were purchased from other projects, including a landfill-gas plant in Utah.

Only 1 percent came from solar.

RECs, mandates, additionality—my head was spinning like those windmills, which were seeming further away. To make matters worse, in , only 67 percent of my Blue Sky bucks purchased RECs; the remaining 33 percent was spent on staff and publicity. Utilities insist that the promotion is necessary, since voluntary green power programs work better when lots of people participate. Nationwide, only about a million customers shell out for green power—with corporations, governments, and universities buying the bulk of it.

In , residential customers made up only one-quarter of green power purchases.

Premiums can provide that extra profit margin to make renewable projects competitive with fossil fuels. And some utilities are experimenting with other models.

Or instead, I could spend my premium on efficiency upgrades in my new home: It would just take more time and elbow grease than checking a box. Laura McCandlish is a freelance journalist, radio host, and teacher based in Oregon. She previously was a business reporter for The Baltimore Sun.

Understanding Solar Renewable Energy Credits | EnergySage

Mother Jones is a nonprofit, and stories like this are made possible by readers like you. Donate or subscribe to help fund independent journalism. Clara Jeffery and Monika Bauerlein.

Clean Energy Trainwreck: Why Most RECs are Bad, and How to Find the Good Ones

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Laura McCandlish Laura McCandlish is a freelance journalist, radio host, and teacher based in Oregon. Our New Energy Crisis Clara Jeffery and Monika Bauerlein. Paying For My Hot Air: Carbon-Offset Comparisons Kimberly Lisagor.

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