Dutch-based insurer and financier, ING Group, will buy wind energy credits to make up for the power it will use at its American locations.
This article in the Hartford (CT) Courant says the company is having to buy the wind energy credits because it can’t directly buy the wind power for its properties:
Initially, the Dutch financial services firm will purchase enough credits to cover power use this year and next. ING will invest about $600,000 in the credits, according to Philip K. Margolis, an ING spokesman in Hartford.
Like most businesses, ING can’t obtain its electricity directly from renewable energy sources, such as wind. Instead, it is contracting to purchase 70,000 megawatt hours of wind-energy credits. Each credit represents 1 megawatt-hour of electricity from wind energy sources.
Producers of such energy sell the credits through brokers and the money that is raised helps pay for generating electricity by wind, cutting down on energy production by burning fuels such as coal.