PGE staffers canvassing customers to go green

PGE staffers canvassing customers to go green

Jun. 16--OREGON CITY -- By Jim Kadera, The Oregonian, Portland, Ore. Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News

Portland General Electric is looking for more customers like Jim and Patti Bennett.

Already ranked by the U.S. Energy Department as second nationally among electric utilities in renewable power purchased by customers, PGE is pushing for further gains. The company this spring mailed information to 31,000 customers and is knocking on about 20,000 doors to encourage more signups, including in some areas of Clackamas County.

The Bennetts, who live in Oregon City, are among those saying yes after resisting the pitch in the past.

Since 2002, PGE has offered customers options to buy renewable power from wind, geothermal and low-impact hydroelectric generation. The objective is to reduce air pollution from coal and natural gas-fired power plants and to improve habitat for threatened salmon and steelhead.

PGE owns no renewable sources so it contracts with companies specializing in "green" generation. The contracts give those companies a means to expand generating capacity.

The world's largest dry-steam field about 120 miles north of San Francisco provides geothermal power.

The city of Tacoma's Nisqually River project, certified by a nonprofit organization as low impact, supplies hydro power without damaging salmon stocks.

And wind turbines in Eastern Washington and Oregon generate the remainder of the green power that PGE purchases.

However, wind power, for example, does not go directly to PGE customers who sign up and support that option by paying higher rates. Electricity from all types of generators is mixed in the transmission grid that feeds power to consumers in Western states.

About 36,000 residential customers of PGE pay a few dollars extra or more each month for green power. That represents 4.7 percent of the 765,000 customers.

Green participation is 7.3 percent in Portland and 5.7 percent in Clackamas, Multnomah and Washington counties combined, but weak in a few communities.

Among customers in the Oregon City 97045 ZIP-code area, participation is 2.3 percent. In the Oak Grove-Jennings Lodge area 2.8 percent of customers go for green.

The current PGE campaign targets those communities plus 97007-008 ZIP-code areas of Beaverton, where the rate averages less than 3.4 percent, and the 97223 ZIP-code area of Tigard with a 4.8 percent rate. Tigard was included because PGE saw growth opportunities.

"We feel there is a lot of untapped potential for renewable power," said Thor Hinckley, PGE renewable program manager. "Our midterm goal is to get 10 percent (participation) within a few years, but we don't want to stop there."

Participation has been highest in central Portland where PGE repeatedly promotes green power at waterfront festivals and other events, Hinckley said.

David Gray and his wife, Joan Hamilton, who live between Gladstone and Milwaukie, signed up eight months ago and pay about $7 a month more for green power. "I think it's a good thing to reduce the amount of nonrenewable resources that generate electricity," Gray said.

However, that belief isn't always enough to coax customers to sign up.

Jim Bennett said his family's home is energy efficient, and for the past two years he ignored the quarterly requests in PGE billings to go for green.

"About 40 percent of the reason for my holdout was anger over the past dealings of Enron," he said. "The young man (representing PGE) who came to our house recently said 'You're not the first person to bring that up.' "

However, Bennett's mistrust subsided when the PGE representative answered all of his questions satisfactorily. "The deciding factor was learning how much power comes from coal-fired generating plants," Bennett said. He agreed to switch to green power at $3.50 to $4 more per month.

The Bennetts and other green customers have the Oregon Public Utilities Commission looking after their interests.

PGE files annual reports on its renewable-power program with the commission. The PUC staff conducts audits of the program on an unscheduled basis, but less frequently than annually.

Lisa Schwartz, a PUC senior analyst of electric rates, said audits of the reports and another more comprehensive financial audit have shown no attempts by PGE to deceive the commission.

Another layer of monitoring will begin next year. A new computerized system will track each transfer of renewable electricity through the Western power grid, which extends from western Canada south to Mexico, Schwartz said.

California is pushing for the tracking system and funding its development, she said.

"It will be a slam dunk method to assure there is no double selling," Schwartz said. "Our staff will require that all green power resources be tracked through the system" to avoid any attempts to exaggerate renewable-power production and consumption.

Jan Johnson, spokeswoman for PPM Energy in Portland, said renewable power promotions by PGE and other utilities are supporting expansion of wind-power generation.

Owned by ScottishPower, PPM Energy is developing the Klondike II wind farm in Sherman County at a cost of $90 million to provide 75 megawatts annually under a 30-year contract with PGE.

The smaller Klondike I provides 10 percent of the Sherman County property tax base, Johnson said, and the wind farms are a boon to wheat growers. Farmers earn lease payments for wind turbines on their property and have more than 98 percent of the land free to grow grain, she said.

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