April 17, 2002—Pennsylvanias Allegheny College recently announced that 7.5% of its electricity will come from wind power—a percentage higher than any other college or university in the eastern United States has invested thus far.
Allegheny will purchase a portion of New Wind Energy from Community Energy, Inc. (CEI), a clean energy marketing company in Pennsylvania. New Wind Energy is electricity supplied from newly developed wind resources in Pennsylvania and the mid-Atlantic region. Wind-generated electricity is the fastest growing energy source in the world, and is produced without fuel and pollution.
Allegheny College has committed to purchasing more than one million kilowatt hours New Wind Energy each year, which equals more than one-quarter of the output of a new wind turbine to be built in the Allegheny mountains of southwestern Pennsylvania.
According to Community Energy, Inc., the College’s 7.5% commitment will prevent nearly 1.3 million pounds of carbon dioxide (a major contributor of global warming and climate change) from polluting the air and produce environmental offsets equivalent to planting nearly 89,000 trees or driving nearly 1.1 million miles less.
