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Comment by mehrdadn | Hacker News Reader

This is weird. So if I run a wind farm that generates 1 MW(...h? why is this an energy unit and not power? but whatever...) and I use all of that electricity myself, I can also sell 1 REC to someone else so that they claim they run on green electricity. Which means that now either (a) I have to legally claim I run on dirty electricity (which is a lie on its face and make no sense???) or (b) we both claim we run on green power, double-dipping and screwing up the accounting of greenness.

Am I misunderstanding something? How does this work?

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No that's how it works. That's also the reason why Norway, despite only using hydro, has only 40-50% renewable energy in some statistics. They sell green energy certificates to consumers abroad (e.g. in Germany). Officially, Norwegians then use coal power whereas in reality it's all hydro power. There isn't even enough transmission capacity to the south to get that kind of exchange physically.

Wow! And I just realized there seems to be another loophole: that means (say) a company like Apple could start a separate power company in Norway based on hydro power, have that company completely waste 100% of the energy it produce there, and yet "buy" the equivalent REC in another jurisdiction where they run on coal and suddenly get to 100% "green" power... potentially even making more money in tax credits, if there are any, all while consuming more and more dirty power without actually helping anybody shift to renewable energy. Right?

Go one better, waste your 'green' energy on crytocurrency mining to buy more 'green' energy for cryptocurrency mining to buy more ...

Yes in theory, but noone would like to just waste energy like that. If they instead sold it they would not be allowed to sell it as green energy.

I think the important point here is to make sure the energy you buy is certified green (or whatever the proper term is, in Sweden we call it urspungsmärkt) the way Apple does. If everyone did there would be no demand for coal power any more.

If everyone did there would be no demand for coal power any more.

That's not possible, because for Apple to buy these credits, someone else has to buy the green energy as if it was non-green. You can't have credits for everyone unless the whole energy being sold is actually green, not just green on paper.

I don't see the loophole there. That just sounds like wasting energy and also buying credits. What is the advantage of that over doing something sensible with the energy instead?

The loophole is not that the second company is wasting the energy. (Like you said, it could even try to profit from it, e.g. by [as someone else mentioned] mining Bitcoin or doing something else that's "unclean" -- that only makes the loophole worse.) Rather, it's the fact that it's a secondary company getting paid by the primary company so that the latter can claim it runs on green energy when it doesn't. And both can profit in the process.

That isn't a loophole, that is how the system is supposed to work. The right to claim you run on green energy is something you can sell. This means that:

1. Actually running on green energy is a competitive advantage.

2. The cost is borne by companies who want to be able to claim they are running on green energy.

This allows companies that want to be ethical to subsidize the cost of green energy even if they can't literally run on green energy due to logistic issues.

What would be the point of this "loophole"? This is pittance money for All the big companies, Apple, MSFT, Google etc. I don't think most consumers even care about whatever marketing buzz this might generate.

This is a net positive whichever way you spin it. Pollution doesn't understand state or country boundaries.

Although in the grand scheme of things this is probably a good idea and a net positive, it is still kind of absurd when you look at the individuals.

Take Norway for example, it was said earlier that they officially run on only about 40% green energy. However in actual reality they run closer to 100% on green energy and everyone there knows it. Then a coal power factory somewhere can buy the Norwegian credits and claim to be 100% green and sell that. It's no wonder many people don't like this scheme.

But as you say and I agree, it is probably a net positive.

"Net positive" unless there are more drastic measures companies decide not to take because they feel like they're already doing something/doing their part. I see a real danger in doing too little only because you feel like you're doing enough.

> Then a coal power factory somewhere can buy the Norwegian credits and claim to be 100% green and sell that. It's no wonder many people don't like this scheme.

No this is not happening anywhere, where are you coming with this kind of things?

Coal company producing only coal-generated power don't buy green credits.

If 100GW renewal energy is produced, who or how it is being used is irrelevant, because the alternative would be 100GW energy generated through non-renewable resources. I don't in which version of reality is that a bad thing, regardless of who buys whatever REC credit.

I think it comes down to giving them credit for funding the construction of massive clean energy projects, even if they don't exclusively use the electricity from that project themselves.

Look at Microsoft. They just funded a deal to build out an absolutely massive solar farm in Virginia.

https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2018/03/21/new-sol...

They do have facilities in state that will only need a fraction of that power to be 100% green, and the excess will be pumped into the local Virginia power grid and used by consumers there.

Basically, Microsoft is saying that they funded the project to generate excess green energy in one place to offset the dirty energy they consume in areas where there is no local green power option available.

100% renewable energy by purchasing and funding renewable energy is an outstanding acheivement.

Is there another statistic for measuring how many KWhr or MWhr are sourced directly from renewable energy sources (or, more logically, 'directly' from batteries + hemp supercapacitors between use and generation)?

Exactly. It is not a loophole assuming we have stable and steady use of electricity. I.e before bitcoin.

Apple funded or has lots of JV across the world, producing renewable energy. It is only a matter of time before they force /help their supplier in doing so as well.

My guess is in five years time Apple product will be net zero non-renewable electricity from transport to manufacturing.

The effort to convince the companies in it's supply chain to follow suit has already begun.

>Though the 100% figure covers only Apple’s own operations–not those of of the suppliers and contract manufacturers which do much of the work of bringing its ideas to life–it’s also convinced 23 companies in its supply chain to sign a pledge to get to 100% renewable energy for the portion of their business relating to Apple products.

https://www.fastcompany.com/40554151/how-apple-got-to-100-re...

No, because the Hydro plant can't both waste the energy and sell it. In order to sell it they have to provide it to the grid.

That would be an incredibly expensive loophole just for a claim. Also, at least in the States, I believe you have to actually feed the energy into the local grid in order to qualify for REC, not just merely produce it.

Power generators connected into a grid, pool their production and then consumers draw from that pool. A consumer can't claim "My electrons came only from "green" sources". Ones electrons came from the nearest sources. What a consumer can do, is pay a producer connected to the grid, to supply "green" energy matching the consumer's draw from the pool.

It's like balancing a checkbook. When you act as a producer, your windfarm puts 1MW into the pool. Logistically, you have to buy it back to claim you consume green power, otherwise you run on the grid's energy mix.

(This is broad strokes, and may vary depending on your location.)

This is unfortunately really how it often works.

In Germany there's been quite a lot of debate around this and the more serious green energy providers try to compensate this by saying that they'll have a certain share of their power come from new installations of renewable energy.

This may seem counterintuitive at first, but it makes sense: Ultimately what you care about is not which share of the currently installed electricity you pay for, but how the money you pay shapes the future energy marked.

> (b) we both claim we run on green power

That's the difference. You CAN'T claim it's green power after you sold the certificate. Even if it's literally directly connected to your house.

Imagine it like a portal in your electric cable.

Regarding units: power plant outputs are given in power units (e.g. watt, or megawatt, horsepower, etc.) because these are innately normalised to some unit of time (watt is a Joule per second). If you stated an output of 1 MWh, I would immediately ask "how long did it take to produce that?". I tiny solar cell that powers your calculator could generate 1 MWh eventually, but the problem is that it would take a very long time, so stating its output in power units gives you a better idea of its capability.

Fun fact: some horses are capable of about 10 horsepower.

> ...so stating its output in power units gives you a better idea of its capability.

I think you misunderstood, because that was entirely my point—I was saying I don't get why they talk about MWh rather than MW when it makes more sense to talk about power rather than energy. [1]

[1] https://www.vox.com/2015/11/9/9696820/renewable-energy-certi...

Haha, you're right. Sorry, I should have read more carefully!

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