John came on the CUB scene after his retirement following a successful career in business and the insurance industry. He became involved with the AARP and brought that organization on board with the lobbying efforts of CUB and the Fair and Clean Energy Coalition around SB 1149, the Oregon Electricity Restructuring Act of 1999. John was at the Capitol every day talking to legislators and decision makers about the bill. When asked by a Committee member why he was there representing AARP, since renewable energy and energy efficiency were not AARP issues, John looked up and tactfully explained that they were AARP issues and they affected all of us. John saw the connections and made energy issues a priority for himself and his community.

After CUB won a lawsuit saying that PGE could not charge customers a profit on the closed Trojan nuclear plant, PGE went to the legislature and got the legislature to retroactively change the law so that utilities could earn profits on plants that were no longer operating. CUB successfully led a referendum campaign to overturn this law. But referendum campaigns are not easy - you have just a few weeks to collect thousands of signatures. John stood outside of the Salem Post Office for many, many hours collecting signatures. When the deadline to turn in signatures came, John was one of only 2 community volunteers to have personally gathered over 1,000 signatures.

CUB Staff Attorney Jason Eisdorfer, who worked with John throughout the SB 1149 process and then later also when John had joined the CUB Board of Governors, had this to say about John's work: "At CUB, it has become standard practice to inform all new participants in the public interest area of energy and telecommunications, whether they work for CUB or another organization, of John Glascock's work. Without exaggeration, we continue to relay a couple of 'John Glascock' stories to younger people new to the issues as examples of how to do it." He continued, "As a result of John's influence, energetic and enthusiastic young advocates, who have never met John, are being influenced by him to go out and do the right thing in the right way."

Bob Jenks's comment was simply that John provided a good example of how much good work one person could do, and John did all of what we know of him after his retirement! John did more good for the state of Oregon after his retirement than most of us do in our entire lives. We are thankful for the years that his energy was directed our way.

Posted by Oregon CUB at 01:11 PM | Comments (0)

September 07, 2007

Go Carbon Neutral with Cow Poop

We wish we'd said it first, but at least we can quote The Oregonian as they describe the newest environmental sustainability program to come from an Oregon utility, as "moo power." NW Natural will now be offering a Smart Energy Program to allow customers to offset their carbon emissions, and part of the process involves using cow manure. The Oregonian gives a lot of details about how "the natural gas utility just won state approval to help turn a potent greenhouse gas, methane from cow manure into electricity or recycled gas."

The plan is to capture the methane from cow manure and burn the resulting biogas for energy production. This creates a new sustainable energy source while at the same time removing a proven greenhouse gas from the environment. Or, as quoted in the New West newspaper of Bend: "In perhaps the greatest statement of all time, NW Natural said it likes the idea taking a problem such as the smell and pollution from cow feces and turning it into a positive."

What neither paper reports is that the discussions for this Smart Energy program, in which customers can pay a few dollars more per month to offset the carbon dioxide produced by their natural gas consumption, began with CUB Executive Director Bob Jenks. He went to NW Natural a few years ago with a proposal: since Oregon's large electric utility companies are now offering renewable portfolio options to help customers cut their carbon output from electricity consumption, we should help customers do the same on the gas side. He argued that Oregon's renewable electricity programs' success, ranked tops in the nation for voluntary participation, boded well for interest in a similar program aimed at natural gas users.

The company was originally concerned about overtly linking natural gas, a relatively clean-burning fossil fuel, with the carbon emissions that feed global warming. But perhaps due to the increased visibility of global warming in the past two years, NW Natural did eventually agree that the idea was a good one. The company put together the Smart Energy Program, to help customers "green up" their gas usage. The result is easy to use and ready to go, and makes NW Natural the first stand-alone gas utility in the nation to offer customers a way to go carbon neutral. You can find out more about the program on NW Natural's website, and even sign up for Smart Energy in a matter of minutes (we already did!).

Bob Jenks's daughter Macy was captivated by the reports of this aspect of her dad's negotiation work ("You had a meeting about cow poop?!"). She produced a picture of the cow, the poop, and a nice warm home heated by the latter. We tried really hard to find that illustration to share with you here; unfortunately, we failed and you will just have to draw your own.

Posted by Oregon CUB at 11:16 AM | Comments (1)