Green Electricity & Ethical banking

hardpressed

I need advice. I've decided I must bite the bullet and change to green electricity but I'm really confused. Been with Powergen forever with no problems and after reading lots of horror stories from people who have switched and had problems I don't know who to choose. I know I probably won't save money but hopefully won't have to pay anymore than now. Suggestions please.

Now down to ethical banking, been with Barclays for years, you can see I don't like change, bit of a wimp. Do I go with Smile or Reliance Bank? Anyone bank with Triodos? Any advice please.

Moggles_2

These are wide-ranging issues to deal with in a single thread.

You may receive more replies quicker, if you post these two important topics separately.

ailuro2

I like Smile, been with them a few years now, great customer service, a UK voice at the end of the line, and a decent interest rate for current account to boot.

Groovy pink cheque books too.

kittiwoz

For the green electricity I'd suggest you go with EquiClimate from EBICo. A lot of "green" tariffs either charge you a premium for providing energy from renewable resources that they would have to do anyway under current legislation or put money into carbon offset schemes which are often of rather dubious benefit and are essentially business schemes with added subsidy for supposed environemental benefits. If you go with Equiclimate they buy carbon shares and retire them essentially reducing the threshold limit for UK industry.

ailuro2

I suggest you go to Uswitch and click on the choose green option once you have put in your details.

You might find it is significantly dearer to use 'green' electricity and would choose to spend the money on a private form of green fuel for yourself- roof pipes would be paid for in a few years of not paying higher prices where we live, and the money it would save would bring down the repayment time too.
And of course,reduce the amount of fuel burnt in the first place to reduce your carbon footprint on the world.

We would pay around 350 pounds per year more for green electricity.Some of Scotland's electricity is already Hydro, so it's hard for me to make that leap over.

caffeinehit

If you've never switched supplier before then you're likely to be able to save money even switching to a green option - Powergen and their ilk are quite happy to shaft customers who show no signs of moving. Admittedly you'd save more money with a non-green option, but even a green one is unlikely to leave you worse off financially than you are now.

The papers were full of switching horror stories a couple of years ago and I guess that's when your friends had problems? I work in the industry and I know a lot's been done since then to iron out the problems and make sure it's as quick and simple a process as possible.

As ailuro2 says, Uswitch does a green comparison service (use the link in Martin's switching article so you get the free champagne ). I think Friends of the Earth or similar charity has details of each company's green credentials if you'd like to read up on them. Who is the 'greenest' is a subjective matter as they all go about it in different ways, but all of the companies on the Uswitch list have some sort of environmental commitment so have got to be better than blindly going with whoever will flog you power the cheapest.

Paul_VW

been with smile for about 3 years, and i can recomend them

tiddles

same here!

martinpike

As has been mentioned before, there's Green and there's Green.

The only two truly Green options I know of are Good Energy and Ecotricity. Good Energy supply you with 100% renewable energy right now, and you will pay a premium for that.

Ecotricity will supply you with partial renewable energy (10% in the first year, growing by 10% a year I believe), with the rest coming from traditional sources. However, they will directly invest all of their profits into building new renewable energy sources. They charge the same as your local 'traditional' supplier.

Both are truly committed to the Green cause, they just have different approaches to reaching the same goal.

If there are other 'truly Green' options, I'm all ears.

Cheers, Martin.

Etheco_2

Hi all,

I'm Rich, part of the etheco.com team and I've introduced myself in a different thread but I thought that what we're doing was particularly relevant to this thread.

We have an energy switching service on our current site (which is going to change quite a bit) but I think we're unique in that our calculators include Co2 emissions as well as being rated ethically using our own rating system.

This may be of interest so here's the link - www.etheco.com/energy

I joined the forum because I hope we can learn something from the posters here and hopefully contribute back as well, so feedback is very welcome.

btw, Martin is right about the green electricity providers. Good energy is 100% renewable. The next closest is Ecotricity at 17.4% and then Greenenergyuk at 0.9% !

martinpike

Etheco wrote:

btw, Martin is right about the green electricity providers. Good energy is 100% renewable. The next closest is Ecotricity at 17.4% and then Greenenergyuk at 0.9% !

Surely those numbers can't be right? I believe the Good Energy and Ecotricity ones, but I thought ALL electricity providers had to source a minimum percentage (way above 0.9%) from renewable sources?