It Ain't Easy Being Green
Illustration by Justin Jones
For the past week, we’ve been ruminating over a stack of Nashville Electric Service documents showing that in 2007 and so far in 2008, Al and Tipper Gore have actually increased the amount of electricity consumed in their 10,000-square-foot Belle Meade mansion, compared to previous years. In 2006 and 2007, the couple burned through 190,623 and 212,642 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of electricity, respectively. As of this month, the couple has used 90,900 kWhs of TVA juice, more than during the same period in 2006 and 2007.
This is a bit of a surprise, considering the Gores' well known conservationist stance on the environment and the kerfuffle that erupted last year when it was discovered that the Gores use more energy than the entire nation of Ecuador. (Kidding!)
Gore spokeswoman Kalee Kreider says that while electrical consumption at the Gore manse—which also serves as offices for the power couple and their respective staffs—has increased, she says that, overall, there has been a 40 percent reduction in energy use at the house, which she says is carbon neutral. She explains that by using solar panels and installing a geothermal heating and cooling system, the Gores have realized a 97 percent reduction in their gas bill. Kreider also says the Gores are enrolled in the Green Power Switch program through TVA. This means that all of the Gores’ electricity has been generated by wind farms, solar collectors or methane gas, further reducing their carbon footprint. This energy is purchased in blocks, and Kreider says that the Gores always overestimate how much they need and, in essence, pay for more than they use.
“They never wanted to have a situation where they didn’t purchase enough blocks of green power,” Kreider says.
Good thing too. Because here comes the Tennessee Center for Policy Research, with this presser yesterday, shouting that the “Energy Guzzled by Al Gore’s Home in Past Year Could Power 232 U.S. Homes for a Month.” It's unclear how many of those “U.S. homes” are 10,000-square-feet and double as workplaces for a full staff of office workers, but this should definitely get some right-wing tongues wagging.
UPDATE: See a summary of the Gores' energy usage courtesy of NES. Download file (XL document).
Comments
I'm just curious: does the Tennessee Center for Policy Research do research into anything besides the Gore's electric bills?
Posted 06/18/2008 at 09:26:59 AMI appreciate everything the Gore are doing to reduce their energy consumption, but I'm still left curious why the Gore home has increased its use of metered power from our local public utility. Given all the things their spokesman listed that they are doing, including supplimenting metered power with solar panels and geothermal energy, why is the home using more metered power from the local public utility?
Going green is great, but when you fail to conserve at the same time, it doesn't matter what the source of the public utility's power is if you continue to use more and more.
It's a huge unanswered question that once you cut through all the hyperbole of the TCPR release is at the heart of what they are reporting: that despite the additional green power sources, the home is still continuing to use more and more metered power from the local public utility.
Posted 06/18/2008 at 09:46:16 AMYou should scan and post those documents.
Also, how many people actually work on staff at his "house"? (Just curious)
Posted 06/18/2008 at 12:48:32 PMYou say you spent a week "ruminating" over these bills and then give your readers a bunch of confused facts that cannot be interpreted to mean much of anything. The Gore's use of electricity may have increased, but what about the overall engery consumption. What did the increase in energy efficieny do? Did it increase efficiency of the use fo energy other than electricity? did it switch the use of gas powered resources to electricty powered because as the limited facts show, electricty is provided by renewable resources via the TVA. You might have asked the Gore's spokesperson while she was trelling you that overall energy consumption was down. You incomplete reporting job is followed by the patently bs Tennessee Center for Policy Research report that compares the use of the average monthly household use of electricty to the annual use of electricty at the Gore's commerical and residential property. By that bogus logic the average us household could operate for 12 months on the average household annual energy use. We must all be wasting energy. Everyone who promotes energy conservation can be a hypocrite. Next up, it's a socking revelation that it actually requires the use of energy to promote conservation! What a useless, sensational, lazy piece of reportage!
Posted 06/20/2008 at 11:04:05 AM