Changing electricity providers part I

So, it's been a while... apologies.

I decided to start with electricity. I found out that the burning of fossil fuels to create electricity accounts for 35-40% of the UK's carbon emissions. In 1989, when the energy market was deregulated, approx. 3.5% of the supply was from "deep green" sources (wind, tidal, solar). Today, over 17 years later, that percentage is... wait for it... still 3.5%. Brilliantly, the government's target is for this to be 20% by 2020 (that's 13 year's time). Go, Tony Blair.

Anyway, last year my household used 3,254 units of electricity, the generation of which created 1.3 tonnes of CO2 (the same as a return flight to New York). My current provider is the evil EDF, who last year not only did not contribute to the creation of green energy sources, but were in fact among the top 5 UK CO2 emitters.

I found that most of the electricity providers provide a "green" tariff, which largely seems to involve paying a premium to guarentee that your energy comes from an exisiting green source ("old green"). Of course, this does not actually mean that your house is wired up to a wind turbine, the provider just makes sure that enough green energy goes into the National Grid to cover your usage. Some also provide off-setting (planting trees to counterbalance the CO2 produced in the generation of your electricity).

This didn't strike me as actually doing much to solve the problem in the longer term i.e. making a step-change in the capacity of green energy supplies in the UK. Sure, some of them (most for example nPower) do invest something in new green sources, but it didn't seem to be top of the agenda.

The search goes on...