“Green” went mainstream last year, as state and municipal governments and businesses across a range of industries embraced the call of environmentalists to recycle, reduce carbon emissions and make their operations more energy efficient.
In January, Gov. Donald L. Carcieri committed Rhode Island to joining the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative – a pact among 10 Northeastern states committed to reducing the region’s carbon emissions by 10 percent by 2019.
Last summer, a stakeholders group assembled by the governor began meeting to pick sites in the state where wind energy farms can be developed. And last month the state signed an agreement with an Australian energy company developing a technology that draws power from ocean waves.
At the same time, carbon-emissions reduction and energy efficiency became concerns for businesses large and small in 2007. Examples include the rapid growth of SolarWrights Inc., a Bristol-based solar-panel and wind-turbine installation company that was one of the state’s fastest growing firms; and utility company National Grid’s announcement in December that it plans to reduce its carbon emissions by 60 percent by 2050.
The growing environmental awareness came as scientists warned that climate change is already altering Rhode Island’s coastline and estuaries and making storms more frequent and powerful.
But the embrace of energy-efficiency measures by businesses and governments arguably had more to do with soaring energy prices. Gasoline, heating oil, electricity and natural gas prices all reached new record highs in 2007. •
