Purchasing renewable energy for your home is one way of stimulating demand for green power generation. Green Tags provide another way to make voluntary, direct contributions towards the construction of renewable energy sources.

Green power plants produce electricity and environmental benefits by displacing electricity on the electrical grid produced by conventional power plants, reducing overall CO2 emissions. These environmental benefits can be accounted for under a Green Tags scheme. Electricity is then sold as generic electricity, while the environmental benefits are packaged under Green Tags. Individuals or businesses can buy Green Tags and either retire them or use them to offset their emissions. Individuals who cannot purchase green power can still achieve the same environmental benefits by buying Green Tags in addition to purchasing ordinary electricity.

Because Green Tags are traded commodities, market forces can affect revenue streams to green power plants which rely on Green Tag income to offset the costs associated with the new technology. Another concern with Green Tags is whether the money spent on them is used to support existing green power generation facilities or if it used to fund construction of new facilities. (see Regional Green Power)
Dave Chiu

CATEGORY: ENERGY PROJECT