Environmental Stewardship

Finding energy efficiency improvements in your home has been shown to be the most cost-effective way to reduce our energy use and capture cost savings. At the same time, one will achieve improvement to the environment by reducing the pollution that is released when electricity is produced or fossil fuels burned. Energy costs have been and are projected to keep increasing. Jesus taught us to love your neighbor as yourself. By reducing our energy consumption we can demonstrate love to our neighbors by reducing toxic air emissions better protecting public health and by reducing greenhouse gas emissions, helping to mitigate the climate chaos created by such emissions. In our nation alone last year we had at least a dozen severe weather events that each resulted in over a billion dollars in adverse economic impact to our nation plus the loss of many lives.

On Sunday March 11, 2012 we enjoyed a discussion on 12 easy and practical ways to reduce energy consumption in your home. James Cavallo, Principal at Kouba- Cavallo Associates and a former research economist at Argonne National Laboratory, led a discussion on how to conduct a simple energy audit of your home's energy use and how to implement simple yet meaningful measures to reduce energy consumption and realize significant savings in your energy bills. This program followed earlier Environmental Stewardship programs on choosing an alternative electricity provider and installing solar and geothermal renewable energy systems.

A copy of the presentation is available below.

As Christians, we are all charged with the responsibility to care for our planet. New alternate energy technologies have an important role in helping the nation become energy independent, reduce greenhouse gas emissions and, as fossil fuel energy costs increase, reduce residential energy costs. Whether you design a new home or wish to improve the energy efficiency of your existing home, solar energy and other technologies are rapidly developing into cost effective sustainable energy resources. Among these technologies are solar collectors, solar hot water systems, heat storage vaults, ground source heat pumps, photovoltaic electricity and solar panels. On January 15, 2012 we learned firsthand from Michael Moats and Lois Salle about alternate energy technologies that can be used in your home now. Michael has built a home about one block from our church that uses these technologies. A link to their presentation is below. We are planning for a meeting at our church in March to talk more about ways to retrofit your existing home to make it more energy efficient. The Power of One is real. If we each do something, together we can make a real difference!

A new Illinois law governing the disposal of electronic items became effective January 1, 2012. Details on this law can be found at: http://www.epa.state.il.us/land/electronic-waste-recycling/index.html and http://www.dupageco.org/recycling/

The Environmental Stewardship Work Area views this change in the law very favorably. It requires responsible disposal of items that are hazardous to the environment. As a church and as individuals, we must ensure that we comply with the law. Any person who violates the this new law can be fined $7000. The electronic items which are under the new disposal ban are: televisions, monitors, printers, computers (including tablet computers - Please put these in our Collection Bin in the Church Office! ), electronic keyboards, facsimile machines, video cassette recorders, portable digital music players (Please put these in our Collection Bin in the Church Office!), digital video disc players, video game consoles, small scale servers, scanners, electronic mice, digital converter boxes, cable receivers, satellite receivers, and digital video and disk recorders. These items must be taken to approved electronics recycling locations. (A link to a complete list of acceptable items is on the Going Green section of our church's website.)

On Sunday, October 9, some of us heard a presentation regarding electrical supply options that you can choose now. In fact, you can pick an electrical supplier that is less expensive and that uses more renewable energy sources than is currently in the mix for the supplier you most likely still have. If you switch electrical suppliers, you still will receive your bill from your current utility, but the place on the bill where you are charge for your energy, will be passed through to the supplier. After you change electrical supplier, you will notice nothing, except probably a less-expensive supply charge and a lower bill.

To evaluate your options, you can go to the website: http://www.pluginillinois.org.

We were encouraged to learn that Illinois is requiring all electricity suppliers to have an increasing, albeit still small, fraction of their supply to come from renewable sources. Currently, in Illinois, most of this is from wind turbines. However, beginning in 2016, utilities will be required to start having some of their electrical supply from solar energy. I recently selected a supplier that was more than 15% less expensive than my current electrical supplier and produces most of its energy from renewable wind energy. Also, important to me, was flexibility in my supplier. The electrical supplier that I selected does not have any guarantee period or contract period, so if I want to change my supplier, I can easily change. Selecting an electrical energy supplier with a large portion of its supply from renewable sources will help bring about cost-effective change for all and will help lessen our impact on the environment.