Peninsula Clean Energy creating greener future

Peninsula Clean Energy is a public local agency founded by all 20 cities in San Mateo County as well as the county itself to help meet local climate action goals. The governing boards representing these jurisdictions all took action to join PCE without a single dissenting vote. This remarkable consensus reflects the strong environmental leadership demanded by our constituents, and their desire go cleaner and greener, in sharp contrast to disturbing efforts in other parts of the nation to opt back into deadly, polluting energy resources such as coal.

Our residents and businesses made a wise choice in backing Peninsula Clean Energy to be our electricity provider, as they now benefit not only from cleaner electricity but also rates that are five percent lower than Pacific Gas and Electric’s. The typical residential customer saves about $22 per year for PCE’s standard ECOplus option, using electricity that is 50 percent renewable and 85 percent carbon-free, generated mostly by wind, sun and water.

PCE offers customers the option to do even more for the environment by choosing 100 percent renewable energy with our ECO100 plan. ECO100 costs about $4 a month more than ECOplus for the average household, but it is a deal at 13.7 percent less than the cost of a similar product from PG&E. Any customer can choose to switch to ECO100 on Peninsula Clean Energy’s website or by calling its customer service number.

Local cities, towns, agencies and the County of San Mateo are further demonstrating their environmental commitment by utilizing ECO100 for their own operations. Together they avoided an estimated 10,000 metric tons of greenhouse gases from local government operations in just one year — equivalent to taking more than 2,000 cars off the road annually. That honor roll includes Atherton, Belmont, Brisbane, Burlingame, Colma, Foster City, Half Moon Bay, Hillsborough, Menlo Park, Millbrae, Portola Valley, Redwood City, San Carlos, San Mateo, Woodside, SamTrans, Caltrain, San Mateo County Harbor District and the County of San Mateo.

Portola Valley went even further when its Town Council voted to make ECO100 the default option for all its residents and businesses. And Facebook chose ECO100 to power its corporate headquarters in Menlo Park, as have a number of smaller businesses.

To provide its cleaner energy, Peninsula Clean Energy is actively bringing more renewable energy onto the California grid. PCE signed two contracts for a total of 300 megawatts of new solar power to be built solely for San Mateo County customers, enough to power more than 160,000 homes when in full operation. These installations are expected to employ a peak construction labor force of 755 workers within California.

With Peninsula Clean Energy, San Mateo County is proving that local action to build sustainability is good for both our Earth and our economy.

Dave Pine is president of the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors, and Jeff Aalfs is a member of Portola Valley Town Council. Both serve on the Board of Directors of Peninsula Clean Energy.