Here’s how to buy renewable energy from your electric utility company.

As carbon emissions from fossil fuels continue to warm the planet, environmentally conscious consumers may be wondering if there is a way to buy electricity from renewable sources without installing technologies like solar panels or windmills on their property.

In short, the answer is yes.

However, this option is not necessarily available to all homeowners and renters. This also often comes with a small price premium, experts say.

Renewable energy sources including wind, solar, hydro, geothermal and biomass. had to This will account for about 21% of U.S. electricity generation in 2023, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

The majority, or 60%, of energy sources are derived from fossil fuels such as coal, natural gas and oil. These energy sources emit carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that traps heat in the atmosphere and contributes to global warming.

The White house aimed at generating electricity be free of greenhouse gas emissions by 2035.

A growing number of individuals and organizations are choosing to move away from fossil fuels: some 9.6 million customers. bought 273 terawatt-hours According to the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, renewable energy will be available through voluntary green energy markets in 2022. This is five times more than 54 TWh in 2012.

In the voluntary market, consumers purchase renewable energy from utility companies in quantities that exceed state minimum requirements. More than half of all US states have policies raise share electricity generated from renewable energy sources, although achieving most goals is years away.

Voluntary purchases accounted for 28% renewable energy market excluding hydropower, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, as of 2016. According to the Environmental Protection Agency, they help increase overall demand for renewable electricity, thereby causing changes in the energy mix.

NREL estimates that most of the growth is coming from corporations. Home sales also grew, but at a slower rate.

Only one in six American adults know they may have the opportunity buy renewable energyeither from their electric company or another supplier, according to NREL’s most recent study on the topic, published in 2011.

“The market continues to grow every year in terms of sales and number of customers,” said Jenny Sumner, manager of the modeling and analysis group at NREL.

“But very few people know” they can participate in green programs, she said. “It’s just not something that most people care about.”

Energy companies can offer so-called green pricing programs.

Clients of these programs also known as Green energy programs pay their utilities a “small premium” to source electricity from renewable sources, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

The cost typically exceeds the utility’s standard electric service by about 1 to 2 cents per kilowatt-hour, Sumner said.

That roughly translates to an increase of about $5 to $15 per month, Sumner said. Ultimately, this will depend on factors such as the price of the program and household energy consumption, she added.

Nearly half of Americans, 47%, said they ready to pay more obtain electricity from 100% renewable sources, according to a 2019 survey conducted by Yale University’s Climate Change Awareness Program. On average, they said they were willing to pay $33.72 more per month.

Green Energy Marketing Programs

Consumers in some states can also participate in clean energy marketing programs.

Such states have “competitive” energy markets, meaning consumers can choose among many different companies to produce their electricity. But unlike green pricing programs, the company generating the renewable energy may not be the customer’s utility that distributes the energy.

According to the U.S. Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency, clean energy options in homes available in these states with competitive or deregulated markets are: California, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas and Virginia.

They also typically come at a premium, although in some areas they “may be cost competitive with default electricity options,” the agencies wrote.

Community Choice Aggregation

Thanks to “public choice aggregation” programs, local governments buy power from an alternative green energy supplier on behalf of its residents.

The municipality essentially acts as the community’s electricity supplier, Sumner said. These programs are especially common in California, she said.

Unlike other types of programs, residents generally do not have to agree to community choice programs; This is usually automatic, and consumers can opt out if they choose, Sumner said.

Just because a consumer chooses renewable energy does not mean that the electricity supplied to their home comes from those renewable sources.

This may seem strange, but it has to do with the physical nature of electricity and its movement through the general electrical network.

“Once the electrons have been injected into the grid, there is no way to tell which are green electrons and which are not,” said Joydeep Mitra, director of the power grid program at Michigan State University. “Nobody knows which electrons go where.”

Instead, green energy programs rely on “renewable energy certificates,” or RECs.

The certificates are essentially a mechanism to account for the production and purchase of renewable energy, Mitra said.

You may not be getting green energy, but someone, somewhere is. And RECs monitor all this.

Any customer, even those who do not have access to a green energy program through their utility, can also purchase REC as a separate, stand-alone product. It’s a way to secure additional financing for a renewable energy project that would typically be sold by a broker or marketer rather than a utility, Sumner said.

Purchasing these certificates individually does not affect the consumer’s existing relationship with the utility.

Experts recommend choosing a green power option, or REC, that has been verified by an independent third party.

This is because voluntary sales and purchases of renewable energy are not subject to Government oversight, according to the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy.

One such independent body is the Center for Resource Solutions, a non-profit organization that oversees Green-i certification standard, the agencies said.

For example, Green-e monitors energy suppliers’ disclosures to consumers about renewable energy and verifies, among other things, that purchases of that energy do not count toward government energy mandates.

In this new series, CNBC will look at how climate change means for your moneyfrom retirement savings to insurance costs and career prospects.

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