When you turn your light switch, TV, or plug up your smartphone, do you ever wonder where the power that brings these devices to life comes from?

Without going too deep into the intricacies and variations in the electrical grid, here is a brief overview of how electricity is distributed in the United States.

Energy producers are power generators that harvest coal, natural gas, nuclear, hydro-electric, geothermal, bio-waste, wind, or solar energy.  Regional Transmission Organizations (RTOs) are open electricity markets who source their energy from thousands of energy producers across the country. RTOs trade their wholesale energy to energy providers. The energy providers supply local companies who then deliver that energy to residential, commercial, and public customers.

Energy as you can see, changes hands a number of times before reaching your home or business.

I back-traced my energy bill here in Chicago.  I found that my power is delivered by ComEd (Commonwealth Edison), provided by Integrys Energy Services Inc, and traded by PJM (Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Maryland) Interconnection LLC. PJM currently receives energy from over 1300 energy producers. After that, it is nearly impossible to say what percentage of the energy reaching my house comes from coal, nuclear, natural gas, hydro, wind, or solar. Presently we do not have a choice of which energy source you receive power from.

However, RTO’s, like PJM, do publish a breakdown of their current sources.  The pie-chart below shows PJM’s entire energy capacity by source.

(Image courtesy of PJM)

Ok, we’ve sort of figured out where our power comes from.   Why does where we receive our power matter?

There is a huge debate over energy going on right now.  Fossil fuels vs. Renewables.  Fossil fuels like coal, oil, and gas are a limited source formed over an extended time period in the ground from the remains of once living organisms.  It takes a great amount of energy to extract and exploit the energy from fossil fuel sources.  The process of extraction and exploitation of that energy often leaves behind byproducts and contaminants that are emitted into air and the ground.  While fossil fuels are cheap and reliable, we are currently experiencing unimaginable after effects of this process around the world.

Renewables such as wind, solar, hydro, and geothermal are energy sources that will not be depleted.  For the most part, they do not produce byproducts that harm the environment.  The process of extracting energy from these sources generally requires far less energy than that of fossil fuels.   While you are likely very familiar with the debate by now, one thing has changed over the last ten years.  The US has recently been producing record amounts of fossil fuel energy.

A recent Gallup poll indicates the majority of Americans are in favor of protection of the environment at the risk of limiting fossil fuel energy supply.  In the same report, Gallup says that 83% of Americans believe the energy situation in the US is serious or very serious, and 64% of Americans would like energy producers to emphasize production of alternative energy rather than fossil fuels.

While I believe God provided us with all of these wonderful resources to generate energy,  like most Americans, I really want to see more renewables come online in the PJM energy market and others across the country.

In Genesis 1-2, we see that the earth and everything in it was created by God who entrusted man to manage it.

The Lord God placed the man in the Garden of Eden to tend and watch over it. (Genesis 2:15)

All the animals of the earth, all the birds of the sky, all the small animals that scurry along the ground, and all the fish in the sea will look on you with fear and terror. I have placed them in your power.(Genesis 9:2)

God gave man a great power, to subdue everything on the earth.  He has given us everything we need be good managers of the resources he provides.  He also has given us the freewill to choose how we manage things.  Throughout the bible we also see consequences when we mis-manage those resources.  We are clearly starting to see the impact of our mis-management of resources as the sky, water, and ground become filled with more and more contaminants.  The people are clearly in favor of producing renewables, yet we see producers moving in the opposite direction and even fighting incentives for citizens and businesses to get involved in adding excess alternative energy to the grid.

Today most of us don’t have a choice of where our energy comes from, but we can choose how our country will continue to generate electricity.  Many states have passed renewable energy standards, legislation requiring their utilities meet a certain percentage of renewable energy by a certain year (i.e. 20% by 2020).

So what can we do?

1. Support renewables by installing renewable energy generators that tie in to the grid or purchase Renewable Energy Certificates (RECs) .
2. Be sure the people you vote for will legislate and enforce renewable energy standards.
3. Be good stewards of the power we receive.

As church technical artists, we know our systems use considerable amounts of energy for weekend services and special events.  It’s not only important for us to understand where our power comes from, but also where it’s going.  In the next few posts, I will discuss these three methods and more ideas the church can use to make meaningful improvements to it’s stewardship of energy.