FatCow Buys Renewable Energy Certificates

Web hosting provider FatCow (www.fatcow.com) announced on Wednesday that it has purchased wind-generated renewable energy certificates from wind energy marketer and developer Community Energy to offset all of its electricity use at its offices and data centers.

FatCow is buying 4,412,000kWhs per year of wind-generated RECs, the total volume of which is comparable to the entire output of one 1.5MW wind turbine over the course of one year.

When compared to the average generation mix in the national electric grid, the estimated environmental benefit from this purchase is equal to offsetting about 2,260 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year, says the company.

RECs are designed to fund new and existing renewable energy projects and ultimately give developers a greater financial incentive to build more more of these projects.

Some have criticized the purchasing of RECs and carbon offsets as a promotion tactic to boost a company’s image without having to reduce their own carbon emissions or directly use renewable energy sources.

However, it can be said that participating in an REC or carbon offset program shows that company is at the very least making some effort to improve its ecological footprint, and often times is the only option for those businesses that do not have access to renewable energy in their area.

Other web hosts to recently purchase RECs include BurstNET Technologies and BounceWeb.

FatCow says it decided to purchase the renewable energy certificates after receiving feedback from its staff, as well as letting customers host green sites of their own.

“Quite frankly, our employees and our customers were the driving factors behind our decision to go green,” says Paul Bukhovko, FatCow’s marketing manager. “Our staff members encourage responsible environmental behavior inside the office and practice it outside the office. And, we know that many of our customers feel just as strongly. We wanted to give them an opportunity to reduce their own carbon footprint by hosting their sites on servers 100 percent powered by wind energy.”