This piece, written by Dr. Olson Huff, originally ran in the Raleigh News & Observer on May 18, 2013. As a doctor, I regularly witness how harmful pollution created by burning coal and other fossil fuels affects public health. As a pediatrician, I have spent decades caring for children whose health is most compromised when [...]
Installing a solar energy system on a home in Florida may soon be less of a financial headache for residential property owners. That’s because the Florida legislature recently passed House bill 277. It exempts the value of renewable energy devices from the assessed value of new and existing residential property. The bill awaits the governor’s [...]
Charlie Coggeshall, SACE Renewable Energy Manager, also contributed to this post. Last month the Tennessee Valley Authority proudly announced what they considered to be good news: That their 2013 Green Power Provider (GPP) program had already met its 2013 solar application target as of April 24th. Even though there is still a strong demand for [...]
Do you want to invest in solar, but you can’t? Maybe your roof doesn’t point south, or it’s shaded most of the time. Maybe you rent. Maybe you just can’t come up with the up-front cost of a solar system. Well, if your local distributor is Duck River EMC, all those problems are solved! Duck [...]
Although it has been over four years since more than a billion tons of coal ash were dumped on the small town of Kingston, TN, the city is still working to clean up both its river and its image. As part of that image cleaning effort, the city of Kingston recently approved a contract for construction [...]
REAP grant applications are due April 30!
Just over a year ago we made the decision to continue to practice what we preach with the installation and activation of our own solar photovoltaic array at our Knoxville, TN office. As part of a series of energy efficiency improvements to our new office, we knew that installing the solar system was the ideal [...]
This guest post was written by Mindy Luber, President of Ceres and Director of the Investor Network on Climate Risk (INCR) and was originally published on Forbes.com on March 19, 2013. It has been re-posted here with permission. Unless you’re talking about motherhood and apple pie, it’s nearly impossible to get 80 percent of voters [...]
With the announcement from Vatican City that Cardinal Jorge Bergoglio has been elected the 266th pope of the Roman Catholic Church, a whole bevy of analysis has begun on the newly elected pontiff including his chosen name: Pope Francis. When I heard this, I immediately wondered, is Pope Francis the new “green” Pope?
For folks not following Catholicism, it may have been easy to overlook the green credentials of Pope Francis’ predecessor, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. In 2007, Vatican City became the first carbon neutral country in the world under Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. As part of that decision, a forest was planted to absorb as much carbon dioxide as the Vatican emits annually. Just a year later, over 2,400 solar panels were installed on the Vatican’s papal audience hall. In 2010, the Vatican decided to expand its solar program to 100 megawatts – decidedly making Vatican City the greenest country on the planet. Other green credentials of Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI include a publication by the Papal Academy of Sciences noting the dire effects of climate change on glaciers, an entire sermon for the celebration of the World Day of Peace in 2010 titled “If you want to cultivate peace, protect creation,” and last but not least, evaluating an all-electric, solar-powered Popemobile.
SACE Renewable Energy Manager, Charlie Coggeshall, and SACE Director of Research, John Wilson, contributed to this post. This week, we celebrate George Washington’s birthday to honor the leadership of our first president in particular, and that of our founding fathers in general. Our founding fathers had a bold vision for the United States–a land of [...]
