Buying Green Power: Does It Make Cents for Your Company?

Can your company justify buying green power? Can it do so in business terms? That depends on your corporate goals and branding strategy as well as your organizational philosophy. Some businesses can cite precedent for values-based expenditures made for reasons beyond the bottom line. Others have as much as told us, "If I can't make the case in dollars and cents, it will fall on deaf ears. I know it might sound draconian, but that's the way it is."

Although a green energy purchase should not be expected to pay for itself with a direct economic return, such an investment is not without its tangible offsets. These benefits have been persuasive with CFOs and other decision-makers at several Fortune 500 companies. Green energy purchases are no longer the exclusive province of the Ben & Jerry's of the world. In the process of gathering and evaluating disparate tangible benefits into a complete menu of arguments for making the green energy business case, we conclude that the three most compelling arguments are, in order of importance:

• Quantifying the free, or "earned," media value of renewables;
• Using renewables to help hedge against escalating electricity rates that are based on rising fuel costs; and
• Using renewables to attract the few but loyal customers who use their spending power to support companies that help the environment.
• This report is intended to be passed along to your nonresidential customers who may be considering a green energy purchase and is written for those end users.

This report is available to E Source members at http://www.esource.com/members/default.asp