Dominion Green Power is in some ways bringing up the rear (Virginia isn’t generally an early adopter of such things, and the utility is a regulated company), but good progress is being made with their program to create more access to green power in the Commonwealth.

According to Liz Thomson, who runs the program in Virginia, the utility doesn’t profit from the sale of RECs, and the program is designed to be self funding. So, as the company gains converts to this way of building green energy capacity, there is a lot of effort required to communicate with customers. 3Degrees is the consultant for the company, and reports put the administrative and promotion costs at about half of the program’s revenues at this stage. An outreach team is being recruited to multiply the early success that has seen over 6,000 signing up to pay more for certified green energy generation.

While many won’t pay extra for green, similar programs across the country are getting 2-4% participation, Ms. Thomson says. Another complicating factor is that consumers are “not getting green electrons all of a sudden,” since the source of an individual’s power won’t change. Even so, more than 50% of the participants in the Virginia program purchase RECs for 100% of their energy requirements.

“As a regulated entity, we provide reliable energy, and we also want to provide as many options as possible,” Thomson said. Customer feedback has been incorporated into everything from the inception of the program to the Web site design. 

As the program continues to develop, the outreach will incorporate more general education and contact with small businesses and other prospects. The parent does pursue a number of conservation activities, and has a semi-active blog site covering Green Power and other programs. Other bloggers in the green arena offer great food for thought, including James Fraser of The Energy Blog and Terrence Murphy’s Green Energy Reporter.

While this program is a clear indicator of demand for ways that consumers can encourage green power development, some argue that without an overhaul of the energy infrastructure there will be no real progress. Sierra Club has promoted the idea in some areas, but also had negative things to say about the cost of administration in the Virginia program.

Full disclosure: We have done work for utility companies and are working on a coal-fired plant advocacy program in Virginia. We do not work for Dominion.

Regardless of your position, though, isn’t really time that we get behind these ideas that allow consumers to involve themselves in a positive movement to get more generating capacity based on wind, solar, biomass, landfill gas and other resources? If just a fraction of the participants in social media passed along the recommendation on RECs, for instance, we could surpass that 2-4% participation easily.

More participation = more generating capacity = lower costs for renewable energy-based power. Seems like a great equation to me.