Since a few days I'm a happy customer of
Lichtblick, the biggest
electric utility (
Stromanbieter) in Germany which provides 100%
green energy (or
kostrom as it's called in Germany).
Why?
I was getting tired of all those hypocrites and liars (a.k.a. politicians) who keep on
talking about
global warming and
renewable energy, but fail to produce any real
results since many, many years now.
So I decided to do my (small) part to help reduce CO
2 emissions, the
greenhouse effect, and global warming. After
measuring the energy consumption of all my power-sucking devices and replacing or turning off some of them, and after replacing all lightbulbs with highly efficient
energy saving lightbulbs, changing the electric utility was the next logical step.
First try (failed)
As probably almost everyone in Munich, I was a customer of the
Stadtwerke M nchen (SWM). According to the last electricity bill I got from them, their sources of energy are: 17% renewable energy, 83% fossil energy sources, 0% nuclear power. Well, at least they don't use nuclear power, that's a big plus IMO, but 83% polluting, fossil crap? Thanks, but no thanks.
So I opted to use their
kostrom M-Natur tariff, which (they claim) provides 100% renewable energy. They use the so-called
Aufpreismodell (sorry, German only), i.e. you pay a few cents extra per kWh, and this extra money is invested in renewable energy sources (mostly small
hydropower plants around Munich).
As I found out a few hours later (d'oh!) this "Aufpreismodell" is not really ideal (you still pay a conventional electric utility instead of one with 100% renewable energy, for instance). In addition, I stubled over
a petition for the city of Munich to stop investing in a new fossil fuel power plant (bituminous coal, to be more precise). Which I promptly signed (and which went to several local parties including the greens, the mayer of Munich, and others).
Now, this is what I call hypocritical behaviour — on the one side they claim/pretend to be environmentally friendly by promoting their "M-Natur" tariff, and at the same time they invest even
more money in fossil fuels? WTF? Anyway, it seems the petition did have at least some impact, the aren't allowed to invest more money into that fossil fuel powerplant than they already did.
For me that was more than enough reason to immediately revoke my M-Natur tariff, and what's more, I switched to a completely different company now,
Lichtblick (see also the respective
Wikipedia page). I'm not willing to support such energy policies/politics with my money anymore.
Lichblick
Lichtblick is an
kostromanbieter in Germany, supposedly the biggest one.
Their "
energy mix" is 100% renewable energy (which is correct, unlike with SWM, as they do not own any additional fossil fuel plants). 76% of that is hydropower, FWIW.
Their
prices may be a bit higher than those of conventional electric utilities, but not all that much; you might even pay
less, depending on where you live and which tariff you have now. You can use their
price calculator to find out.
Btw, some other good choices in Germany are
Greenpeace energy,
Elektrizit tswerke Sch nau, and
Naturstrom AG.
How the switch went
Easy. Grab the respective
PDF, print it, fill in the required info, and send it to them. Alternatively, they also offer online registration. It'll take a few weeks until the switch is performed; they have to contact your current electric utility etc. In my case it took ca. 4 weeks.
There are no additional costs for switching. There is no "downtime" whatsoever (not even a few seconds), German law requires that you always reliably get your electricity 24/7 (and it indeed worked just fine for me).
So, that's that. From now on I'm happily using green energy all day (and night) long. I'm doing my part in Saving The Planet (tm) and I sleep a bit better at night...
P.S. No, I'm not getting paid by Lichtblick (or anybody else) to write this.