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Penn State Buys Green

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Submitted by christopher on Fri, 2006-12-29 13:41

Penn State (home to legendary football coach JoePa) has arranged to purchase more than 20% of its electricity needs from renewable sources over the next 5 years.

"Under the 2001 contracts, when wind energy was our only renewable energy option, the University paid $14.00 per megawatt-hour (MWH). Under the new contracts, with other sources now available, we are paying an average of $5.00 per MWH," said Michael I. Prinkey, energy program engineer in the Office of Physical Plant.

PSU has a press release discussing the new contracts.

Under the contracts, the major sources of generation are wind, 8.1 percent; biomass, 3.9 percent; low-impact certified hydroelectric, 7.9 percent; new technologies (solar and bio-mass) 0.6 percent, for a total of 20.5 percent.

"In examining our energy requirements," he said, "our goals were to support new technologies, look at cheaper energy sources, and maintain our commitment to Pennsylvania-generated sources. We were able to achieve those goals and increase the total purchase to 20 percent of our electrical energy needs within our budget goal."

The University of Minnesota - Twin Cities campus is larger than University Park at State College in PA, but Penn State is a larger system on the whole. I haven't heard of the U doing something like this, has anyone else?