South Bay nonprofit celebrates 5 years as clean-energy provider
Local and state elected officials from 13 Santa Clara County communities that receive green energy from Silicon Valley Clean Energy (SVCE) gathered at the Cupertino Earth and Arbor Day Festival April 23 to commemorate a sustainability milestone.
SVCE, a Sunnyvalebased nonprofit, started providing green energy to local municipalities five years ago.
“I am proud of the emissions reductions Campbell, and all SVCE communities, have accomplished in the past five years,” said Campbell City Councilmember and SVCE Board Chair
Liz Gibbons.
“Having joined SVCE as a founding board member, it is inspiring to see the climate actions that have spread from adopting a locally controlled clean energy agency to creating demand for building new renewable energy projects in the state, all the while controlling customer electric power rates and coordinating agency-wide implementation of building electrification codes, as well as providing scholarships and grants for youth.”
SVCE was formed as a Joint Powers Agency in 2016 by local jurisdictions and began service in 2017, and now provides carbon-free electricity to more than 270,000 residential and commercial customers. Since then, SVCE staff says using cleaner power has helped local communities reduce energy-related greenhouse gas emissions by 35% compared to a 2015 baseline and avoid a total of 575 million pounds of said emissions from being released into the atmosphere.
In addition to clean electricity, SVCE has provided financial and technical support for local decarbonization programs that the agency estimates has saved customers more than $77 million on their electricity bills.
For more information, visit www.svcleanenergy.org/community-impact.