So why are Greenchoice customers paying a carbon tax?

I heard the CEO of ACTEW on the radio the other day defending this. I’m an old far and I’ve heard a lot of obfuscation in my day, but this bloke is a master. He sounded as if he was barely controlling his anger at the temerity of us idiots to dare suggest that there was anything untoward about this. When asked direct questions about it he dodged and weaved as well as any politician I’ve ever heard.

I tried to call ACTEW to cancel my greenchoice option but, because it’s part of my bundle, they had to put me through to a different section. After waiting 20 minutes, constantly being told how important my call was, I gave up. I filled in their online form this morning.

Not just Actew. Also Origin Energy:

“If I have GreenPower, why am I still experiencing an electricity price rise on 1 July due to the carbon scheme?
Homes and businesses including those which purchase GreenPower, receive their electricity supply from the National Energy Market grid which is affected by the carbon price. It is not possible to direct renewable energy to a particular property.

An energy bill for a GreenPower customer contains two components:

Electricity supply and usage charges – which will increase due to the introduction of the carbon scheme and other factors such as upgrading of the supply networks
GreenPower charges – which will NOT increase due to the carbon scheme, and Origin is actually discounting some of these prices from 1 July to reduce the impact of the carbon scheme on your overall electricity bill”

http://www.originenergy.com.au/1544/GreenPower-Green-Gas

1967 said :

whitelaughter said :

HiddenDragon said :

perhaps ActewAGL could at least stop sending out the glossy, expensive-looking brochures and booklets with their quarterly bills. That would, one way or another, save a few trees and the other financial and environmental costs involved – the money saved wouldn’t do much to keep electricity and water costs down, but it could still pay for something useful, like a few more apprenticeships each year.

+1

Yup,
If you need to constantly remind people what a good job you’re doing providing a service in essentially a monopoly market, you’re probably not doing a very good job.

Well you could go onto their website and register to receive electronic notifications for your bills instead of complaining about it…
No dead tree bills = no glossy brochures. And the brochure is still available online if you want it.

breda said :

Ergo, you are a classic example of how people get sucked in by ‘greenwashing’. The CO2 tax has nothing whatever to do with the green power scheme. The green power scheme was about buying more green power than was currently required by the stupid mandated requirements – so, instead of buying $100 worth of subsidised power from windmills in that quarter, as required by law, thanks to you they bought $100 plus half a cent.

As has been ably demonstrated by other posters, this is not what ActewAGL claims. Greenchoice is literally the only green scheme I’ve ever paid money for, and it was only because there was a documented, clear result for my investment. Based on the bullshit non-answer of ActewAGL’s mouthpiece in the original story, I’ve now got serious doubts about their integrity in this area.

Incidentally, your hospital analogy touches on what I suspect may be a contributing factor to Greenchoice price staying high: if it became too popular, it would completely screw up the grid.

Carbon. The 6th chemical element, which is the basis of all life on Earth.

Chlorine. The second most abundant halogen and 21st most abundant chemical element in Earth’s crust. Chloride ions are essential to the survival of many species, including humans.

So go breathe some. Inhale deeply. It’s natural, and a basis for life!

SnapperJack said :

Schadenfreude at all those trendy, politically correct leftists paying extra on top of their token, feel good efforts to save the planet.

Welcome to the real world, losers. But I doubt they will be upset for too long.

Just get the CPSU to get the shinybums yet another pay rise to cover it. Wouldn’t it be great to just pick banknotes off the money tree like the PS greenies. Then you can just watch the ABC, read The Canberra Times, pooh pooh the “shock jocks” and “tabloid TV shows” and ignore pensioners dying from cold because they can’t afford electricity.

I would like to say that I will be experiencing schadenfreude when serious climate change kicks in and all the deniers start bleating about how no-one warned them that it would be like this. Unfortunately there will be no joy involved because the rest of us will have to deal with the consequences of your selfishness and pigheadedness as well.

Oh, that’s right. Climate change isn’t a well-tested scientific theory supported by the best scientists from NASA, the CSIRO, the world’s major universities, the UN and every government on the face of the earth. It;s merely a hoax to part leftists from their money. Latte-sipping morons.

SnapperJack said :

Schadenfreude at all those trendy, politically correct leftists paying extra on top of their token, feel good efforts to save the planet.

If it makes you feel any better, Snapper, I’m sure there are many pinko latte-sipping lefties out there who realized Greenchoices was not for them and channelled their naive appreciation of renewable energies into solar systems before June last year so that you could have the opportunity to subsidise their feel-good rebates and hippy feed-in tariffs.

Last night on telly I saw an ad for them with a whole heap of smiling faces saying “we’re here to help you get the most out of your electricity” or some similar claptrap. I felt like punching one of them. They need to get rid of the expensive commercials and the glossy pamphlets to gain my trust.

Schadenfreude at all those trendy, politically correct leftists paying extra on top of their token, feel good efforts to save the planet.

Welcome to the real world, losers. But I doubt they will be upset for too long.

Just get the CPSU to get the shinybums yet another pay rise to cover it. Wouldn’t it be great to just pick banknotes off the money tree like the PS greenies. Then you can just watch the ABC, read The Canberra Times, pooh pooh the “shock jocks” and “tabloid TV shows” and ignore pensioners dying from cold because they can’t afford electricity.

whitelaughter said :

HiddenDragon said :

perhaps ActewAGL could at least stop sending out the glossy, expensive-looking brochures and booklets with their quarterly bills. That would, one way or another, save a few trees and the other financial and environmental costs involved – the money saved wouldn’t do much to keep electricity and water costs down, but it could still pay for something useful, like a few more apprenticeships each year.

+1

Yup,
If you need to constantly remind people what a good job you’re doing providing a service in essentially a monopoly market, you’re probably not doing a very good job.

Carbon. The 6th chemical element, which is the basis of all life on Earth. And we are being forced to pay a tax on it. What a joke this has become, courtesy of the Green Left lunatic fringe, scaring the whole world with their doomsday scenarios about too much of this life-based element destroying the world.

breda said :

How could you possibly be ‘carbon (dioxide) neutral’, when you depend every second of every day on coal or gas fired plants to kick in when your preferred source of energy isn’t delivering?

If you use 10kWh of energy per day, and you pay for 10kWh of green energy per day, even if only on average, then you are carbon neutral. It’s irrelevant that you use carbon-positive energy at some times, because at other times people are using the carbon-neutral energy you paid for. I’m amazed a concept like this is not obvious. I suspect it is obvious, but you’re trying very hard to be nasty.

breda said :

Have you even the faintest conception of how the power grid works? Next, you’ll be saying that the stars are like God’s daisy chain.

If your preferred behaviour on the Internet is to denigrate everybody else then you should go hang out on 4chan and spew anonymous vitriol at other malcontents. But this is RiotACT and Canberra is a very small place. It’s quite likely we will one day have to work together so behaviour like yours online also reflects badly on you in real life. Try acting your age.

I hope I never become as cynical and bitter as you’ve obviously become.

HiddenDragon said :

If it is too hard to separate those slippery little electrons, and so spare their well-meaning customers the carbon tax, perhaps ActewAGL could at least stop sending out the glossy, expensive-looking brochures and booklets with their quarterly bills. That would, one way or another, save a few trees and the other financial and environmental costs involved – the money saved wouldn’t do much to keep electricity and water costs down, but it could still pay for something useful, like a few more apprenticeships each year.

Agreed. This brochure has given me the sh**s for years. What a complete waste of money. I’d much rather see another young person or two into their workforce than receive that crap.

nhand42 said:

They are now passing the costs of carbon-tax onto customers who until last month were being assured they were carbon-neutral.
————————————————–
Boy, do I have a bridge to sell you. How could you possibly be ‘carbon (dioxide) neutral’, when you depend every second of every day on coal or gas fired plants to kick in when your preferred source of energy isn’t delivering? Are you OK with them existing so that your family member in hospital doesn’t get the ventilator switched off when the sun goes down or the wind isn’t blowing? Have you even the faintest conception of how the power grid works?

Next, you’ll be saying that the stars are like God’s daisy chain.

I don’t care if you want to live on windmills and solar panels while contemplating God’s daisy chain. Just don’t force me to pay multiples of normal power prices for it so that you can feel better about yourself.

HiddenDragon said :

perhaps ActewAGL could at least stop sending out the glossy, expensive-looking brochures and booklets with their quarterly bills. That would, one way or another, save a few trees and the other financial and environmental costs involved – the money saved wouldn’t do much to keep electricity and water costs down, but it could still pay for something useful, like a few more apprenticeships each year.

+1

As it has been cheaper to burn coal to generate electricity in Australia than to use renewable sources, the only way renewable generation can happen is if someone subsidises it or if the government taxes fossil fuels.

As I understand it, GreenPower has always been a voluntary customer-funded subsidy to renewable power generators. It is meant to be in addition to the subsidies that electricity companies are forced to pay through the renewable energy target (RET). Under the RET companies must surrender each year a set number of renewable energy certificates (RECs), which are paid for by electricity consumers, including those who purchase GreenPower. That is, everyone pays a renewable premium to achieve a 20% renewable mix by 2020. GreenPower consumers pay a premium on top of that to achieve a bit more (say 25% by 2020).

The carbon price puts a tax on carbon emissions, which pushes up the price of fossil fuels like coal. At the moment it is set at a fairly low level, but once the ETS kicks in and the government ramps up the emissions reduction targets the price should go up.

Under the ETS, voluntary purchases of GreenPower should in theory reduce the burden for everyone else, as it will reduce the cost of achieving the reduction target. However, to allow committed individuals to continue to purchase additional abatement, the government has committed that they will factor GreenPower purchases in when setting the target. That is, if more people buy GreenPower, the target will be proportionately higher. Everyone else will have the same burden they would have had otherwise, and GreenPower purchases will achieve additional abatement.

For this to work, just as with the RET, GreenPower subsidies need to be additional to the carbon price. Everyone has to pay more for their electricity due to the mandotory carbon price and RET subsidies, and GreenPower consumers have to pay a bit more on top of that to achieve a bit more abatement.

Simple really.

nhand42 said :

ActewAGL could solve this all very easily. Instead of dividing their carbon-tax bill across 100% of their customers (like they’re doing), they could divide their carbon-tax bill only across customers who don’t pay for Greenchoice. Make the carbon-producers pay for their carbon tax, and let Greenchoice customers continue to pay exactly what we were paying before.

Possibly an easier method would be to discount the charge per kwh for Greenchoice energy by the amount the carbon tax adds to each kwh of “dirty” energy.

Happy to be corrected by someone with better maths/logic skills though.

breda said :

The CO2 tax makes absolutely no difference, just as your dopey decision to pay more for electricity didn’t. It doesn’t change the way power is generated or used one iota. And, given the amount of concrete and metal used in building those bird cuisinarts, expect your feelgood power to cost not only you, but all of us, even more. Concrete and metal production are significantly affected by the CO2 tax. Bird and bat targets are still tax free, though.

I’m amazed at how many people like yourself are getting *joy* from this. It’s like you wanted green power to fail, and this is just confirmation of your own cynical world view.

But cynicism doesn’t equal reality. When you say “dopey decision to pay more for electricity” you miss the point that you don’t pay for electricity, you pay for energy. That’s why it’s measured in kWh. And there are certainly different types of kWh. There are kWh made by burning coal. There are kWh made by turning windmills. There are even kWh made by burning pig manure.

The point of Greenchoice was you got to instruct ActewAGL – using your wallet – how much of which kWh you wanted them to purchase. 10% of their customers on Greenchoice? That means ActewAGL buys 10% of their energy from windmills. You are voting with your wallet, setting the direction of a company, and funding energy sources that you want to succeed.

Now you were more interested in money and selfishly purchased the cheapest power. Very laissez-faire of you. But not all of us live only to make more money. Some of us want to do things that are better for society, even if it means a slight sacrifice in money today. And we even did this in a pure capitalist manner; by voting with our wallets.

This is why we’re angry. ActewAGL has been lying all these years. They haven’t been purchasing kWh of green energy for every kWh of Greenchoice energy sold. They are now passing the costs of carbon-tax onto customers who until last month were being assured they were carbon-neutral. This is outrageous, and the cackling glee from selfish cynics is just obnoxious.

dtc said :

Did people really not understand that the Greenchoice just mean ‘green’ energy was fed into the system, but at the power point end it all came out the same for everyone?

Of course they understood that. Nobody had any false idea that “green energy” made it all the way from the windmills into their personal copper cabling. Everybody understands it’s a shared grid.

Your questionable maths aside, the Greenchoice customers are already paying a premium to have every 1 kWh of Greenchoice consumption matched by exactly 1 kWh of supply from carbon-neutral sources. That’s the way it was and still is advertised. The extra 7.5c ensures *your* household’s energy consumption is matched kWh per kWh by *green* energy production. Nobody cares there’s this shared grid in the way because we all know that’s irrelevant to the desired outcome, which is putting your money where you mouth is and spending more for renewable sources.

Now the carbon tax is supposed to be passed onto carbon producers; those people who don’t pay Greenchoice. However ActewAGL has decided all their customers will equally share the carbon tax; both carbon-producers and carbon-neutrals the same. That’s why we’re angry. If we are producing zero-carbon then we don’t pay carbon-tax. If we are paying carbon-tax, then apparently we are *not* zero-carbon, so what have we been paying for all these years?

ActewAGL could solve this all very easily. Instead of dividing their carbon-tax bill across 100% of their customers (like they’re doing), they could divide their carbon-tax bill only across customers who don’t pay for Greenchoice. Make the carbon-producers pay for their carbon tax, and let Greenchoice customers continue to pay exactly what we were paying before. If you’re a carbon-producer, you will pay for your consumption, or you will move to Greenchoice. Isn’t that the point of the carbon tax? To use a negative externality to encourage migration to green power?

ActewAGL is no doubt doing this because their accounting division is effing hopeless. They screwed up my bills so many times over the past decade. The thought of doing something difficult like division has probably done their heads in.

So we are flogging poor ACTEW for thier alleged ‘GreenChoice’ double-dipping.

Well, how many of you ‘warm and fuzzies’ are still hitting the ‘carbon-offset’ radio button when booking domestic airline flights over the internet?

Jethro said :

Actew’s website is pretty clear that the extra money paid by Greenchoice customers will be used to purchase electricity from renewable sources. The way it reads you would assume that if 5% of Actew customers were paying for 100% abatement, than 5% of Actew’s electricity would be from renewable sources and that Actew’s carbon pollution would be reduced by 5%

Yes, all completely correct. There’s even an external audit to demonstrate that they buy the additional green power that they sell.

Jethro said :

and that the customers who should enjoy the benefits of this reduction in Actew’s tax burden would be those who pay the extra to help them achieve it.

This is where ACTEW gets sneaky. They have never said how much they actually spend on purchasing the additional green power. These contracts and arrangements would be considered “commercial-in-confidence” so there is no way of finding out exactly how much profit they are making on the Greenchoice program as it is all rolled up into a total organisational profit. All they promised was that for an additional 7.5c they’d by a KWh of green power (beyond what they were already required to purchase), not that they’d spend it all on green power. What’s happened now is that prices have gone up for a known reason and it’s become apparent to everyone that the “true” cost of the green power is not 7.5c because the differential should have closed by 2c. They’ve just kept in place the original offer of “give us 7.5c and we’ll by the green power for you”.

Perhaps in hindsight they should have dropped it to 5.5c as it would have made them look less douchy.

@Ergo

“Sure, but my goodwill and benevolence tends to dissipate when it’s being wilfully exploited. I opted for Greenchoice as a matter of taking responsibility for the impact of the energy that I consume. If I cancel it now I’m still doing that, and more, by simply paying the carbon tax. If they fix this situation then I’d probably go back to Greenchoice, but I’m not interested in paying yet another indirect subsidy at this point in time.”

————————————————————————

Ergo, you are a classic example of how people get sucked in by ‘greenwashing’. The CO2 tax has nothing whatever to do with the green power scheme. The green power scheme was about buying more green power than was currently required by the stupid mandated requirements – so, instead of buying $100 worth of subsidised power from windmills in that quarter, as required by law, thanks to you they bought $100 plus half a cent.

The CO2 tax makes absolutely no difference, just as your dopey decision to pay more for electricity didn’t. It doesn’t change the way power is generated or used one iota. And, given the amount of concrete and metal used in building those bird cuisinarts, expect your feelgood power to cost not only you, but all of us, even more. Concrete and metal production are significantly affected by the CO2 tax. Bird and bat targets are still tax free, though.

I’ve got to say, this whole issue is a bit perplexing.

Actew’s website is pretty clear that the extra money paid by Greenchoice customers will be used to purchase electricity from renewable sources. The way it reads you would assume that if 5% of Actew customers were paying for 100% abatement, than 5% of Actew’s electricity would be from renewable sources and that Actew’s carbon pollution would be reduced by 5%, and that the customers who should enjoy the benefits of this reduction in Actew’s tax burden would be those who pay the extra to help them achieve it.

It stands to reason that if you are paying the extra money to fund these renewable sources of energy you should not be paying the carbon tax. Indeed, surely one of the reasons for the carbon tax is to make things like renewable energy sources more economically competitive.

When the carbon tax was introduced I called Actew to make inquiries about changing to green energy, as I figured the price difference would be reduced. No luck, so I didn’t sign up to their green energy scheme. Either Actew is lying about how their Greenchoice scheme works, or they are passing on tax costs that Greenchoice customers should not be liable for.

Did people really not understand that the Greenchoice just mean ‘green’ energy was fed into the system, but at the power point end it all came out the same for everyone?

The deal is that instead of 100% coming from non green sources, now (say) 90% comes from non green and 10% from green. Yes, when you, the 100% greenpower customer, plug in your hi efficiency clock radio, 90% of the power used by that clock radio is not green.

But even if 100% of the power you personally used was green, and 100% of the power used by non-greenpower purchasers was non green, overall it would achieve EXACTLY the same result; namely that 10% of the power used by all customers was sourced from green sources and 90% wasnt.

Yes, it might make you as an individual feel all warm and fuzzy to be using only green energy, or not so warn if you have turned your central heating down to 16, but it would have made no difference to the environment whether you were a 100% green user (and everyone else was a 0% green user) or you were a 10% green user (and everyone else was a 90% user).

Surely the overall impact on the environment is what its all about, isnt it, rather than the feel good factor for you as an individual. I’m sure you all agree…..

Anyway, the carbon tax result is that everyone pays 90%. You, the nice green user person, are subsidising other people. Thanks. If you dont want to do that, then you need to go off grid (and not pay insurance, taxes and all the other subsidies most of us pay)

frontrow said :

What makes me laugh is people crying over having to pay costs that benefit others (ie subsidising the carbon price that non renewable consumers might otherwise pay). The whole point of participating in the greenpower scheme is voluntarily paying costs for an environmental effect that benefits everybody, including the people who went for the cheaper option instead.

Sure, but my goodwill and benevolence tends to dissipate when it’s being wilfully exploited. I opted for Greenchoice as a matter of taking responsibility for the impact of the energy that I consume. If I cancel it now I’m still doing that, and more, by simply paying the carbon tax. If they fix this situation then I’d probably go back to Greenchoice, but I’m not interested in paying yet another indirect subsidy at this point in time.

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

Antagonist said :

G-Fresh said :

Complaining about Elec bills seems to be the current trend

Not sure if the ‘current’ pun was intentional, but it sure gave me a good laugh.

I got a buzz out of it too.

Shocking…

Don’t think we haven’t switched on to what you bright sparks are talking about.

If we only generated electricity using the cheap brown coal burning facilities, each Mwh would result in about 1.2 tonnes of carbon emissions. As it is, a number of factors, including the greenpower scheme, keep the average carbon emissions for all generation sources down to about 0.92 tonnes per Mwh. The impact of the carbon price is related to this average figure.

Greenpower customers could acquire electricity through a separate transmission grid but they don’t as the costs of duplicating infrastructure would be prohibitive. Sharing the same grid as everyone else requires certain pragmatic compromises.

The downside for greenpower customers is the fact that they shoulder a not insignificant share of the carbon price. The upside is that they still have access to the reliability of coal fired generators at times when whether conditions preclude renewable generators from meeting their demand.

What makes me laugh is people crying over having to pay costs that benefit others (ie subsidising the carbon price that non renewable consumers might otherwise pay). The whole point of participating in the greenpower scheme is voluntarily paying costs for an environmental effect that benefits everybody, including the people who went for the cheaper option instead.

Thimble and pea trick. They said that it would contribute to ‘green’ electricity over and above what is already mandated (which we all pay for). So maybe they bought a few more units from windmills or whatever over and above what they were required to. Effect on the world = zero. Legally – probably within the law.

It never ceases to amaze me how easy it is to separate the gullible from their money by making them feel morally superior.

Antagonist said :

G-Fresh said :

Complaining about Elec bills seems to be the current trend

Not sure if the ‘current’ pun was intentional, but it sure gave me a good laugh.

I got a buzz out of it too.

G-Fresh said :

Complaining about Elec bills seems to be the current trend

Not sure if the ‘current’ pun was intentional, but it sure gave me a good laugh.

davo101 said :

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

1) Pay for ‘regular’ electricity and contribute to environmentally friendly electricity through the mandated carbon price

You do realise that pretty much all of the carbon tax they collect is handed straight back out as compensation. In fact if the carbon price drops to the $15 floor in 2015 when the ETS starts the net effect is going to be more compensation than they collect.

Indeed, but the compensation is not handed out evenly, or according to energy use, or according to environmental impacts. It goes to the komrades, er, those who need it most.

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

1) Pay for ‘regular’ electricity and contribute to environmentally friendly electricity through the mandated carbon price

You do realise that pretty much all of the carbon tax they collect is handed straight back out as compensation. In fact if the carbon price drops to the $15 floor in 2015 when the ETS starts the net effect is going to be more compensation than they collect.

Greenchoice …. only thing green about it is the greenbacks going into their bank accounts.

shirty_bear said :

It is now my expectation that ACTEW are simply trousering the extra $$ they charge Greenchoice customers.

…. and only now you have worked this out!!!

davo101 said :

Joshua Gans has a post on this today:

The reason for the confusion is that green energy has never been about actually purchasing green energy. Instead, when you sign up for that you are paying extra for the retailer to do things that promote zero emissions energy — this could range from investing in solar or wind power to purchasing offsets. In principle, you net emissions are zero but your electricity emissions continue to be positive. Hence, the carbon tax.…

That means that an electricity retailer pays a carbon tax and passes it on to all consumers. That is what we are seeing here. To be sure, green consumers reduce the electricity retailer’s carbon bill but that benefits everyone. So they are, in effect, giving a donation to non-green energy consumers. That is something I am pretty sure they didn’t have in mind.

But according to the website http://www.actewagl.com.au/greenchoice/ it is about buying green energy not promoting it. Even the green diagram has it!

If it is too hard to separate those slippery little electrons, and so spare their well-meaning customers the carbon tax, perhaps ActewAGL could at least stop sending out the glossy, expensive-looking brochures and booklets with their quarterly bills. That would, one way or another, save a few trees and the other financial and environmental costs involved – the money saved wouldn’t do much to keep electricity and water costs down, but it could still pay for something useful, like a few more apprenticeships each year.

Complaining about Elec bills seems to be the current trend

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

Regardless of whether you agree with it or not (and I don’t), the whole point of pricing carbon is to encourage more environmentally friendly activity, including energy generation, distribution and consumption. The feds have decided that all of Australia will bear this responsibility, and that the free market will sort things out on this basis. (We won’t talk about certain groups being compensated for now).

Paying for green energy is admirable, but has just become compulsory. As such, you have two choices:
1) Pay for ‘regular’ electricity and contribute to environmentally friendly electricity through the mandated carbon price; or
2) Pay for both the green energy option AND the carbon price.

I don’t think the green energy surcharge was ever about supplying individual properties with actual, certifiable green energy. It was still a good idea, though.

As for me, I’ll be going for option (1) above.

Good summary. So basically ACTEW should now abolish the ‘green energy’ plans, as they have been superseded? Let’s see if that happens….! Then again, I imagine with the number of people cancelling in disgust, that decision may be taken out of their hands.

johnboy said :

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

Yeah, but you didn’t believe it though, right…?

Well no, but I didn’t think they’d try the “it was all just a dream” defence.

Yeah, fair point on that.

johnboy said :

I’m sorry, I distinctly recall being blathered at, at length, that for every green electron consumed one was going to be bought and put into the network so it didn’t matter which electron came out of my socket.”

Common misconception. Electrons do not come out of the socket. Energy does. ACTEW are selling you energy, while you supply the electrons yourelf. Energy simply causes the free electrons that already exist in your wiring to vibrate in unison.

dpm said :

So if they can’t “separate the electrons; the energy doesn’t directly feed into your home, it is added into the electricity grid … on the customer’s behalf” then how can they make people pay more for their ‘green’ energy? Apparently they don’t know which electrons green customers receive, so therefore they have to pay the carboon tax…. What if i’m not getting the ‘green’ electrons I asked for? Can they proove I am?
They can’t have the argument both ways, can they?
This certainly is bad PR and gives me a bad taste about their motives for green energy plans for the previous few years…

I’d be very, very interested to see the figures on how much “Green” energy gets pumped into the grid, compared to how much is sold to voluntary purchasers.

johnboy said :

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

Yeah, but you didn’t believe it though, right…?

Well no, but I didn’t think they’d try the “it was all just a dream” defence.

They probably shoudl have cleaned up the website first:

“You don’t need extra powerlines or installation, a small additional cost on top of your regular electricity bill allows ActewAGL to purchase electricity from renewable sources, like wind power, biomass, mini-hydro and solar. This green energy is then fed straight back into the electricity grid, replacing electricity that would have otherwise been generated by fossil fuels – and that means reduced greenhouse gas emissions.“

From http://www.actewagl.com.au/greenchoice/

The greenies who wanted the carbon tax should be the only ones paying it.

Those who didn’t support it should be exempt.

I feel a little dim for not having twigged to this earlier. I probably would have taken it on the chin if ActewAGL had at least tried to give a genuine explanation, but as it is I’ll be cancelling the Greenchoice option today.

VYBerlinaV8_is_back said :

Yeah, but you didn’t believe it though, right…?

Well no, but I didn’t think they’d try the “it was all just a dream” defence.

johnboy said :

I’m sorry, I distinctly recall being blathered at, at length, that for every green electron consumed one was going to be bought and put into the network so it didn’t matter which electron came out of my socket.

Now I’m hearing it was all just fairy dust? Odd, that’s what I said it was back then but ActewAGL flunkcies were all “No No No we’re putting the green electricity into the grid”.

Yeah, but you didn’t believe it though, right…?

Regardless of whether you agree with it or not (and I don’t), the whole point of pricing carbon is to encourage more environmentally friendly activity, including energy generation, distribution and consumption. The feds have decided that all of Australia will bear this responsibility, and that the free market will sort things out on this basis. (We won’t talk about certain groups being compensated for now).

Paying for green energy is admirable, but has just become compulsory. As such, you have two choices:
1) Pay for ‘regular’ electricity and contribute to environmentally friendly electricity through the mandated carbon price; or
2) Pay for both the green energy option AND the carbon price.

I don’t think the green energy surcharge was ever about supplying individual properties with actual, certifiable green energy. It was still a good idea, though.

As for me, I’ll be going for option (1) above.

Grail said :

(a few staff even have electronic calculators on their desks).

what? no abacus?? sheesh – kids today…

“Confusing”? It’s not confusing – it’s fraud, pure and simple. I’d love to see ACTEWAGL taken to court over this. Class action, anyone? In the meantime, everyone paying extra for “greenchoice” (I’m one) should cancel.

The real issue is the current pricing structure has been approved by regulators, so to change their approach they would need to initiate another pricing determination process. These processes are costly and time consuming in themselves – probably not worth the effort for a dozen green power customers.

Hmm, as a Greenchoice customer I shall be voting with my feet on this news and switching back to normal electricity. This stinks.

housebound said :

Confirms all my suspicions about GreenChoice being just a covert way of raising prices for the gullible.

Voluntarily bending over and spreading their cheeks for ACTEW. D!ckheads.

Grail said :

ACTEWAGL can’t even handle monthly billing or unified billing: I think it is unreasonable to expect them to be able to handle prorating carbon tax based on Greenchoice percentage. I hear rumours that most of their accounting is still done with pencil & paper (a few staff even have electronic calculators on their desks).

If I am paying for 100% green electricity, I should not be paying any carbon price. THAT IS THE WHOLE POINT OF THE CARBON PRICE: encouraging consumers to buy green energy. The Carbon Price is a Pigovian tax.

100% green? No way, I call BS. Somewhere along the line you’re contributing to CC just like the rest of us, like from the appliances you’re powering with the energy. If there was such a thing as 100% green energy, Climate Change would be a non-issue.

Joshua Gans has a post on this today:

The reason for the confusion is that green energy has never been about actually purchasing green energy. Instead, when you sign up for that you are paying extra for the retailer to do things that promote zero emissions energy — this could range from investing in solar or wind power to purchasing offsets. In principle, you net emissions are zero but your electricity emissions continue to be positive. Hence, the carbon tax.…

That means that an electricity retailer pays a carbon tax and passes it on to all consumers. That is what we are seeing here. To be sure, green consumers reduce the electricity retailer’s carbon bill but that benefits everyone. So they are, in effect, giving a donation to non-green energy consumers. That is something I am pretty sure they didn’t have in mind.

I can’t believe that they (the Commonwealth guberment and ACTEW/every other electricity company) didn’t see this one coming and get out in front of it.

Confirms all my suspicions about GreenChoice being just a covert way of raising prices for the gullible.

I don’t buy Greenchoice power coz I think it’s a dumb way to approach the issue … if they want to feed us “green” power, go ahead. Spread the cost. Just do it, don’t half do it. Or pretend to be “green” but do sod all.

But – if I did buy Greenchoice, I’d be ropable right now. This is absolutely outrageous.
And I’m angered by the arrogance, incompetence, and arrant disregard for the intelligence of their customers that ACTEW display.

It is now my expectation that ACTEW are simply trousering the extra $$ they charge Greenchoice customers.

So if they can’t “separate the electrons; the energy doesn’t directly feed into your home, it is added into the electricity grid … on the customer’s behalf” then how can they make people pay more for their ‘green’ energy? Apparently they don’t know which electrons green customers receive, so therefore they have to pay the carboon tax…. What if i’m not getting the ‘green’ electrons I asked for? Can they proove I am?
They can’t have the argument both ways, can they?
This certainly is bad PR and gives me a bad taste about their motives for green energy plans for the previous few years…

ACTEWAGL can’t even handle monthly billing or unified billing: I think it is unreasonable to expect them to be able to handle prorating carbon tax based on Greenchoice percentage. I hear rumours that most of their accounting is still done with pencil & paper (a few staff even have electronic calculators on their desks).

If I am paying for 100% green electricity, I should not be paying any carbon price. THAT IS THE WHOLE POINT OF THE CARBON PRICE: encouraging consumers to buy green energy. The Carbon Price is a Pigovian tax.

This sounds like a total crock of s*** to me.

ACTEW had better come up with a better explanation than “you can’t separate the electrons”, or I suspect the ACCC will be getting a lot more complaints.