NW Natural’s Smart Energy Crosses Columbia to Washington
NW Natural customers in Washington can now join their neighbors to the south and reduce their natural gas footprints through Smart Energy.

“We are thrilled our customers in Washington can now participate in the Smart Energy program and strongly encourage them to considering joining,” says Bill Edmonds, NW Natural’s director of environmental management and sustainability. “We feel strongly that customers like and expect environmental options from their utility and so we appreciate the Washington Utilities and Transportation Commission has approved our request to provide Smart Energy.”

About Smart Energy
Smart Energy helps fund renewable gas projects and is supported through voluntary contributions from NW Natural’s residential and commercial customers. Residential customers offset the use of natural gas in their homes for just $6 per month--that’s less than 20 cents a day. Commercial customers can offset their natural gas use for as little as just $10 a month.

Projects developed through Smart Energy focus on the development of biogas in our region. Biogas helps farmers manage their waste, improves water quality by keeping animal waste out of holding pools and controls or eliminates odors on and around farms. Every day, a typical cow produces 120 pounds of waste. Manure produces methane, a powerful greenhouse gas--twenty-one times as potent as carbon dioxide. With 14 million pounds of cow waste generated in Oregon each day, there's a lot of potential energy just waiting to be utilized.

Investment in the Environment
NW Natural does not profit from funds raised through Smart Energy. The money goes toward greenhouse gas reduction projects, customer education, and administration of the project through The Climate Trust, a leading non-profit organization and one of the largest institutional purchasers of offsets in the United States. The Climate Trust, which will manage the Smart Energy funds, supports innovative strategies to reduce, avoid, or capture global warming emissions.

Smell of Success
So far in Oregon, Smart Energy customers have offset over 51,000 tons of carbon since the program launched in September 2007, and the numbers continue to grow. In 2007, NW Natural became the first Smart Energy customer to sign up for the program and committed to offsetting 100 percent of the CO2 associated with its natural gas heating use for the following five years.

Return to July 2010 Western Energy News

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