Steve McDougal is co-founder of 3Degrees, one of the leading providers of Renewable Energy Certificates and carbon offsets to green building professionals. Through his business and personal efforts, McDougal has made a strong commitment to sustainability. In 2005, he was awarded with the Green Power Beacon Award at the Green Power Leadership Awards Ceremony. Today, he leads the Green Power and Carbon Balancing Services group as well as educates environmental professionals on the value of Renewable Energy Certificates.
What is 3Degrees' mission?
3Degrees' mission is to mitigate the effects of climate change by accelerating the development of a low-carbon renewable energy economy. 3Degrees realizes this mission by helping its green building, utility, corporate, and other partners utilize environmental commodities, such as renewable energy certificates and verified carbon offsets, to build value for their stakeholders. For example, 3Degrees' LEED Green Power Credit Services help green building professionals use renewable energy certificates (also called renewable energy credits or RECs) to offset the energy used by their buildings. In recognition of this impact, the USBGC allows buildings that offset their purchased electricity with RECs to earn LEED points through the Green Power Credit.
Explain the Renewable Energy Certificates and 3Degrees' work with them.
A renewable energy certificate or REC is created for each megawatt hour (1 MWH, or 1,000 kilowatt hours) of renewable electricity generated and delivered to the power grid. The sale of RECs provides renewable energy project owners with an additional revenue stream that supplements the revenues they receive from selling the project's electricity. These additional revenues help make the renewable energy projects more competitive with fossil fuels like coal and natural gas. Organizations interested in reducing environmental impact of their operations match their electricity use with RECs. By greening their electricity with RECs, these organizations increase demand for renewable energy and encourage the development of renewable energy projects.
RECs are needed to track renewable energy generation because once an electron is delivered to the power grid, that electron becomes indistinguishable from an electron from conventional sources. This makes it essentially impossible for an electricity provider to guarantee delivery of only "green" electrons to an office building, factory, or home.
3Degrees purchases RECs from owners of wind farms, solar generating stations, and other renewable energy projects. It then finds buyers, such as green building professionals, for these RECs. In this way 3Degrees helps channel capital to renewable energy projects, increase demand for green power, and makes the market for renewable energy more efficient.
3Degrees can help green building professionals earn LEED points through the Green Power Credit. Tell us more about this credit. What are some advantages?
Under LEED guidelines, green power points can be earned in three ways: offsetting electricity usage with Green-e ®Energy Certified Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs), on-site green power generation from technologies like photovoltaic (PV) panels, and participation in utility's voluntary renewable energy program.
Green buildings can use RECs to earn up to six points through the LEED Green Power Credit. This makes them particularly attractive for green buildings where on-site renewable energy is difficult to install or cost-prohibitive, and for facilities served by utilities that do not offer voluntary renewable energy programs.
What are the costs involved?
Price per MWh depends on volume, vintage (the year the megawatt was generated), and source (the renewable technology used-wind, solar, landfill gas, etc.). Currently, the price for 2011 vintage U.S. wind farm RECs is approximately 0.001¢/kWh ($1.00/MWh). Given this price, the cost for offsetting 100 percent of the electricity used at a typical 200,000-square-foot office building for two years would be approximately $4,680. And, if this building was seeking to secure LEED certification under Existing Buildings (EB) guidelines, v.2009, it could earn six points for this purchase.
How can companies and businesses help make their buildings more sustainable?
As anyone familiar with LEED guidelines knows, there are literally thousands of ways for companies and businesses to make their buildings more sustainable. Generally, these activities fall into one of three categories-reduce, renew, or balance.
The reduce category involves minimizing the amount of energy used through the use of energy efficient technologies and energy conservation's best practices. The renew category is about trying to use green power by installing on-site renewable energy systems or by purchasing of green power through a utility or a third-party REC provider. And the balance strives to mitigate the environmental impact of greenhouse gas emissions related to travel, natural gas use, and other activities by balancing out these emissions with verified carbon offsets from greenhouse gas reduction projects.
Few, if any, companies or buildings are perfect when it comes to sustainability. All have some negative impact on the environment, despite their best efforts. What is important is that these organizations all try to continually make progress on the road to sustainability. One way of doing this is by offsetting their electricity usage with RECs. In doing so, they help mitigate the environmental impact of their energy use, and accelerate development of a low-carbon, renewable energy economy.
Do these services cooperate with on-site solar or other renewable energy projects?
Yes. As we like to say, on-site renewable and RECs are two great tastes that taste great together. On-site renewable are a great way for green buildings to support green power. They provide a visible demonstration of a building's green power use, they support the development of distributed energy (which places less stress on the power grid), and they can provide a financial payback over time. It is for these reasons, among others, that I have personally installed solar panels on my house in Marin. Unfortunately, in most cases on-site renewable are not sufficient to meet all the electricity needs of a building. If you want a building to be 100 percent green powered, the only way to reach this goal is by complementing on-site renewable with RECs sourced from off-site renewable energy facilities. Developing a low-carbon, renewable energy economy is a major challenger. We are going to need all the renewable energy generation we can get-on-site and off-if we hope to achieve this goal.
How does 3Degrees practice sustainability?
3Degrees is always working to move forward on the road to sustainability. For 3Degrees, this means reducing energy use and waste, renewing or recycling what it can't reduce, and balancing out unavoidable greenhouse gas emissions. 3Degrees strives to continually improve its sustainability policies and activities, ensuring that it does not just talk the talk, but also walks the walk.
To support and verify its sustainability efforts, 3Degrees has become a Charter Member of the Climate Registered reduction program, and has applied for Climate Registered Silver status. To secure this status, 3Degrees provides the Climate Registry with a third-party verified annual inventory of its greenhouse gas emissions, and has committed to reducing its absolute greenhouse gas emissions by five percent by 2013.
Other examples of 3Degrees' commitment to sustainability include: helping subsidize fare costs for employees who commute to work using public transportation and providing a yearly bicycle maintenance stipend for employees who bike to work regularly; incorporating sustainability's best practices into day-to-day operations, such as double-sided printing, "smart" thermostats, compact fluorescent lighting, and energy conservation; contracting only with local FSC-Certified printers who use 100 percent soy-based inks for external printing projects; using environmentally sustainable office materials; printing in-house on 100 percent post-consumer recycled paper; and matching 100 percent of the firm's electricity usage with Renewable Energy Certificates, and balancing out all emissions resulting from employees' car and air travel (commuting and business) with third-party verified carbon offsets.
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