Bob McCarty Writes

I knew it would happen eventually and, yesterday, it did:  I found my first offer to purchase so-called “carbon credits” had arrived in the mail.

A review of the offer, which arrived in the form of a postcard-size insert inside the envelope carrying my monthly electric bill, left me scratching my head and wondering.

Delivered under the banner of AmerenUE’s Pure Power program, the offer implies that I need only check the box on my bill to sign up for 100% P.U.R.E. and become a “P.U.R.E. Genius” — that is, a member of the group of “People Using Renewable Energy.”

So how does the program work?  A paragraph on the mailer explains it this way:

When you enroll in Pure Power, AmerenUE purchases renewable energy certificates (RECs) equal to 100% of your electric usage.  That means more reliance on renewable sources such as wind power and less on fossil fuels.  The result is cleaner, healthier air now and for future generations.

Still not understanding, I moved on to the mailer’s next paragraph, hoping a “light” would come on inside my head:

Announcing P.U.R.E. Blocks — a NEW fixed option that meets your budget and lifestyle.  Each block costs a flat $15 and represents 1000kWh of renewable energy introduced into the Midwest Power Pool.  Visit www.ameren.com/purepower or call 866.665.PURE to enroll in the P.U.R.E. Block option.

While I think I sensed some mercury sloshing around “upstairs,” I’m not sure whether it was the fillings the dentist put in my teeth years ago or a compact fluorescent bulb (a.k.a., “CFL”) at work.  Nevertheless, I believe I’m being offered the opportunity to pay $15 to introduce 1000kWh of renewable energy into the Midwest Power Pool.  But for what?  To find out, I went online to the Pure Power web site and found the “answer” they want customers to swallow believe:  Feel good about your power.

Feel good about my power?  Sounds like an oxymoron on par with “enjoyable shock therapy.” But I digress.

AmerenUE’s online version of how I can “feel good” about my power reads as follows:

Signing up for Pure Power makes it possible for you to contribute to a better environment and a stronger economy in our region. The average residential customer who enrolls for a year will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by more than 22,000 pounds?the same environmental benefit provided by two acres of forest every year or taking two cars off the road each year.

In addition to keeping our environment clean and healthy, supporting renewable energy diversifies America’s energy supply, protects valuable natural resources for future generations and provides economic benefits to local schools and farmers.

Skeptical about the claim that Pure Energy “provides economic benefits to local schools and farmers,” I e-mailed AmerenUE’s Susan Gallagher for help.  In turn, she forwarded my inquiry to Cindy Bambini, an employee of San Francisco-based 3 Degrees Group, Inc., AmerenUE’s renewable energy supplier.

Regarding my skepticism about the program providing economic benefits to local schools and farmers, Bambini replied by telling me the benefits surface in the form of jobs, construction, tax revenues and land lease payments in communities where renewable energy facilities are built and pointed me to the 3 Degrees web site page listing renewable energy and carbon reduction projects.  Unfortunately, the site listed no renewable energy facilities in Missouri.  So what am I to think about the offer I received in the mail?

Even if it does benefit schools and farmers in some roundabout way, the utility’s explanations of it read too much like the pitches used by casino operators in Missouri every time they try to push through another ballot issue.

Case in point is the most-recent matter pushed by the casino kingpins, Proposition A.  Among other things, backers of the measure promised it would remove the cap on the amount of money a person can lose during a single day of gambling.  In addition, they highlighted “more money for education” as a key benefit.  At the same time, they ignored the fact that schools just never seem to improve despite access to ever-growing piles of casino cash.

If not because it helps schools and farmers, should I equate participation in the Pure Energy to making a donation? Not according to 3 Degrees:

“If you donate to a charity, you generally don’t get anything tangible in return.  In the case of Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs), you get a tangible, verifiable statement that the actual megawatt hours you consume have been offset by an equivalent amount of renewable power. This provides a legitimate claim to the renewable energy. By purchasing Renewable Energy Certificates (or renewable energy), you are given the right to make any truthful claim about your use of renewable energy.”

That logic makes as much sense as purchasing a college degree from a shady online operator in some far-off locale only to learn before it arrives in the mail that it’s completely worthless.  Can you claim that you learned something in the process of obtaining your degree?  Certainly! And do you have something to show for your effort (i.e., “a certificate”)?  I think you do! Are you better off in the end?  Absolutely not!

Results of Missouri Proposition C

At the end of the day, I suspect the Pure Energy program is simply the first effort made by electricity providers in the state to capitalize on Missouri voters approving Proposition C.  Here’s why:

According to an article about Proposition C on the St. Louis Post-Dispatch web site, Kansas City Power and Light supported the just-approved measure that requires investor-owned electric utilities to generate or purchase electricity from renewable energy sources, such as solar, wind, biomass and hydropower.  So it would make sense for AmerenUE to do the same thing, but company policy appears to prohibit such endorsements (See this site for a statement attributed to Tim Fox).

From the perspective of an outsider looking in, it would appear to provide electric utilities an opportunity to pocket some interest earnings on the cash while they float it for a period of time – who knows, maybe 30 days — at the midway point of the transaction (i.e., at the point after the money leaves a customer’s bank account and before it is dispatched in the direction of 3 Degrees).  Of course, I’m only speculating on this one.

Based upon the publicly-available information at hand, I can only conclude one of the following is true:

• The folks at my local electricity provider are drinking heavily from Al Gore’s cup and might benefit from a dose of INCONVENIENT TRUTH SERUM (Translation:  They believe in human-caused global warming);

• They’re simply using the GLOBULL WARMING alarmism to turn a quick dime; or, perhaps

• They’re doing both.  In a purely capitalistic sense, that, my friends, is “P.U.R.E. Genius.”

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