South Carolina ’s 20 electric cooperatives plan to invest up to $10 million per year towards renewable energy and energy efficiency measures. The investment represents up to 1.1 percent of budgeted gross revenue for Central Electric Power Cooperative, which supplies and transmits power to South Carolina’s electric cooperatives. “Electric cooperatives in the state are setting the pace for renewable and energy efficiency initiatives,” said Mike Couick, CEO of The Electric Cooperatives of South Carolina Inc.

The record investment includes a three-pronged approach to improving the environment and saving energy. The following measures represent the beginning of this process.

• Encouraging homegrown renewable energy . Electric cooperatives in South Carolina will offer a pilot program for net metering for members who wish to install their own renewable energy generation facilities, such as solar systems, in their homes. Net metering will reward consumers who produce more electricity than they use by allowing them to sell the excess to their cooperative. The program will encourage the entrepreneurial spirit of cooperative members and provide a working laboratory for future renewable generation partnerships.
• Producing efficiencies to save energy and money. Cooperatives have set a goal to develop a program to place energy efficient compact fluorescent lights (CFLs) in the home of every cooperative member in the state, approximately 7 million bulbs within 10 years. CFLs use 75 percent less energy and last up to 10 times longer than standard light bulbs. At completion, the energy savings from the program would equal the energy used by 35,000 homes.
• Investing resources in clean energy research . Cooperatives have invested $2.5 million into a partnership with the University of South Carolina to develop technology that reduces carbon dioxide and other emissions from coal-fired power plants. Coal remains the least expensive and most plentiful resource for generating electricity, but its environmental impact is substantial. Plans call for university researchers to develop affordable technologies that will make coal cleaner and more efficient.

The initiatives follow two major studies commissioned by electric cooperatives in South Carolina. The first study explored the potential in South Carolina for producing power from renewable resources. The second study researched the amount of energy that cooperatives and their members could save by using energy efficiency measures.

“These studies are meant to find opportunities, not to find an excuse for inaction as it relates to environmental responsibility,” said Couick. “We purchase power from other sources. This gives us a yardstick to measure those generation sources’ environmental impact. We can’t hold them to an impossible standard, but we need to hold them to the highest standard.

Both studies can be viewed and downloaded at www.ecsc.org in the Newsroom section under News Releases.