Victory: Cobb EMC Pulls Out of Coal-fired Power Plants

Late on the evening of January 24, the board of directors at Cobb EMC made an unprecedented about-face, and voted to freeze the EMC’s funding for two coal-fired power plants: Plant Washington and Plant Ben Hill. Without their biggest investor, these coal plants are now more on the ropes than ever. A consortium of utility [...]

VEC Utility Customers More Informed Than Most

Not all electricity bills are created equal, and today we’d like to commend a local utility company on providing their customers with an exceptionally detailed one. Volunteer Energy Cooperative (VEC) provides information and advice beyond what the average national utility bill presents. Last November, John Wilson, SACE’s Research Director, shared with you a study about [...]

Tide begins to turn against coal-fired Plant Washington

In Georgia, another coal plant is dead, and murmurs from Cobb EMC indicate that the tide may be turning against construction and pursuit of Plant Washington and its twin coal-fired power plant proposal, Plant Ben Hill. Plant Longleaf, a coal-fired power plant proposed near Blakely, GA, was canceled in December 2011 after millions of dollars and more [...]

New EPA GHG Tool and Top 11 Coal Plant Polluters

Last week EPA released a very comprehensive tool by which any member of the public can now easily see just how much global warming pollution their neighborhood coal plant is emitting. Many of the largest GHG emitters are not surprisingly right here in the Southeast. Below is a reposted blog from National Wildlife Federation’s Kendall [...]

GAO takes a close look at TVA efficiency efforts and expense planning

The federal Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report in December that takes a hard look at the Tennessee Valley Authority’s (TVA) energy efficiency efforts and capital expenditure planning. The report recommends that (1) TVA complete its energy efficiency potential study and use that to inform its future energy efficiency efforts, and (2) that the [...]

An Efficient Holiday Season: Eco Entertaining

I wanted to wrap up our holiday series by addressing a final, major seasonal activity that is generally high in energy consumption: holiday entertaining. I know that party planning can be a daunting task at times, and just having a few relatives and friends over for a quiet evening can require hours of preparation. There’s [...]

An Efficient Holiday Season: Decorating Edition

Over the last couple weeks, I’ve shared with you some tips and tricks for minimizing the energy impact of your holiday cooking exploits and your shopping and gift giving activities. However, I’ve not yet touched on the aesthetics of the season. No winter season is complete without the ornamental lights, or the cheerful air of [...]

Our family experience with efficient LED lighting

Energy efficient lighting has never been a more plausible option for your home than it is today. Awareness of coming changes in residential light bulbs is growing. We’ve all seen that the CFL industry has continued it’s upward trend over the last couple of years, but LED markets are expanding rapidly as well; the US [...]

An Efficient Holiday Season: Giving Greenly

Earlier this week, I shared with you a list of tips and tricks for minimizing the energy impact of your holiday cooking activities. As today is one of the busiest shopping days of the year in the U.S., it seemed only fitting to continue our Holiday Efficiency Series with a focus on environmentally-conscious gift giving [...]

New Leadership Signals Trouble Ahead for Plant Washington

Board of Director elections held Saturday, November 12 at Cobb EMC raised the profile of member dissatisfaction with the Atlanta-area utility co-op’s decision-making and leadership to a new level. New board members swept all four seats in the election by huge margins and will be sworn in at today’s Cobb EMC board meeting (Nov. 22, [...]