October 26th, 2008 · No Comments

From the Environmental Protection Agency

The 2008 Green Power Leadership Awards were presented in conjunction with the National Renewable Energy Marketing Conference, held October 26-29 in Denver, Colorado.

Partner of the Year

Bellingham, Washington, is a coastal community near the Canadian border, rated by several popular magazines as the best place to live in the United States. The community received EPA’s Partner of the Year Award in 2007 and continues to display national leadership in the purchase and support of green power.
In early 2007, by a unanimous city council vote, the Bellingham local government chose to lead by example by buying 100 percent green power for all city-owned facilities. Later the same year, the city partnered with the local utility’s green power program and a local non-profit organization to launch the Bellingham Green Power Community Challenge. The goal of the challenge was to increase green power purchasing among the city’s residents and businesses to more than 2 percent of the city-wide electricity use.

To date, the community has far surpassed that original goal and is now buying more than 81 million kilowatt-hours of renewable energy certificates (RECs). This amounts to nearly 11 percent of the community’s total electricity use. More than 2,400 households and businesses have enrolled to buy green power through the challenge. The community’s purchase resulted in EPA recognizing the Community of Bellingham as the first EPA Green Power Community in Washington State.