TCL&P’s Good First Step

Traverse City Light and Power just took a step toward unleashing a powerful jobs and income machine: It installed a new “net metering” policy, allowing TCL&P’s customers to generate limited amounts of renewable energy and sell it back to the utility.
Those who take advantage of the opportunity will significantly cut or eliminate their monthly electricity [...]

Rep. Scripps: Use State Constitution to Ban Great Lakes Drilling

A group of Michigan citizens has launched a new, statewide campaign to make Michigan the first state to permanently ban offshore oil and gas drilling in the Great Lakes. The citizens want the state Legislature to allow residents to vote on a constitutional amendment this November that would outlaw the practice, which is currently illegal [...]

Michigan Moving on ‘Complete Streets’

This week a state House committee will review two bills aimed at supporting “Complete Streets” initiatives across Michigan.
If you like to walk or bike, the bills, HB 6151-6152, deserve your support. They would help communities and road agencies design streets and reconstruct roads so that everyone can use them-walkers, bikers, trucks and cars. In case [...]

A Closer Look at Our 20-20 Vision

Tuesday night, the Michigan Land Use Institute and Michigan Energy Alternatives Project presented a proposal to Traverse City Light & Power’s board that largely supports the bold renewable energy goal the company is contemplating, but calls for expanding it, too.
Our proposal, dubbed 20-20 by 2020: A Clear Vision for Clean-Energy Prosperity, applauds the local utility’s [...]

Going Local’s Good for Utilities, Too

There’s been a lot of controversy recently in Traverse City about whether the local electric utility, Traverse City Light & Power, should build a wood-burning biomass plant as part of its plan to make 30 percent of its electricity using renewable sources.
Of course, nobody wants to be subject to spewing smokestack emissions or watch helplessly [...]

Peddling a Path to TC’s Future

Last week, the Traverse City City Commission hosted a panel of top community leaders for a program called “TC Tomorrow.” A big crowd packed the Traverse City Opera House, listened, and asked questions as an all-star lineup of local folks reflected on recent progress and suggested next steps for making TC a better place.
Next week, [...]

Strong Interest in TCL&P’s Big Green Plans

City-owned Traverse City Light and Power started the year off with a bang: It hosted two public strategy sessions this week about achieving its bold goal of 30 percent renewable energy by 2020.
That’s way more ambitious than the State of Michigan’s mandate that power companies in the state get 10 percent of their energy from [...]

As Dust Settles, Now What?

The accord that many world leaders finally embraced here in the wee early hours last Saturday morning, following a marathon of late-night meetings, negotiations, and political wrangling, amounts to nothing more than a handshake agreement to “keep trying” to reduce carbon emissions around the world.
The limited, non-binding agreement left thousands of activists speechless. Other were [...]

Obama Speech Disappoints Many

For weeks there was a sense of hope that President Barack Obama’s visit to Copenhagen on the last day of climate negotiations would bring with it enough financial backing, political will, and international fanfare to strike a binding deal that matches up with the known science of global warming.
Instead, the speech that he gave here [...]

Tiny Islands Stand Up to Big Powers

One of the most inspiring developments this week is the way the small, underdeveloped island nations now stand up for themselves in the global climate talks.  It’s a big change: At previous climate talks, smaller countries were often pushed aside and forgotten by the superpowers.
Not this year.
These tiny countries are now much more assertive because [...]

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