Currents

An Energy Newsletter for Local Governments

Coming Soon: "Made With Renewable Energy" Labels on Products

The Center for Resource Solutions (CRS) -- the people that brought you the "Green-e" certification for green power products -- announced in early November that it will launch a new "Made With Renewable Energy" label for products in 2004. The label will feature the distinctive Green-e logo and will be available to companies that buy a "significant" amount of certified renewable energy for their buildings and factories. According to CRS, a number of companies have already applied for the label, including White Wave (a maker of soy milk products), the Interface Fabrics Group, Choice Organic Teas, and Lundberg Family Farms, a producer of rice. See the announcement on the Green-e Web site (http://www.green-e.org/media_ed/made.html).

This Thanksgiving, shoppers in much of the eastern United States had the opportunity to buy turkey that had been raised using 100 percent wind energy. Plainville Turkey Farms in New York State is buying its wind power from Community Energy, Inc. (CEI) and is now labeling six of its turkey products with the NewWind Energy logo. Consumers in the mid-Atlantic region can even shop at wind-powered groceries, since Whole Foods Market, Inc., is now buying wind power to meet 10 percent of the electricity needs at its 24 locations there. The company will buy six million kilowatt-hours of wind power each year from CEI. See the CEI press releases at: http://www.communityenergy.biz/cei_pr_turkeyfarm.html and http://www.communityenergy.biz/cei_pr_wholefoods.html.

The "Made With Renewable Energy" label might eventually appear on a wide variety of products, thanks to a recent record purchase by the corporate members of the Green Power Market Development Group. Sterling Planet, Inc. announced in late November that it will provide a total of 795 million kilowatt-hours of renewable energy certificates over the next several years to select members of the group, including Alcoa Inc., Delphi Corporation, DuPont, Interface, Pitney Bowes, and Staples. Sterling Planet's Green America renewable energy certificates are Green-e certified. See the Sterling Planet press release at: http://www.sterlingplanet.com/sp/newsRelease27.jsp.

This story came from EERE Newsletter, 12/2/03.

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