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Arlington Hts. residents can choose green electricity

Arlington Heights residents will be able to choose renewable sources of electricity under the aggregation program the village is pursuing with six other area municipalities, officials said Monday.

The consortium will seek bids for “brown” or traditional energy but will also ask for costs of various levels of renewable energy up to 100 percent, Scott Shirley, director of Public Works, said at the village board meeting.

If the consortium chooses a totally renewable plan as its base, residents will be in the program unless they “opt out,” Shirley said. If the base plan is “brown,” residents will choose whichever plan they want.

The renewable plan would be the base only if its price is very close to a brown plan, he said.

Those who have already chosen a different third-party provider of electricity do not have to opt out of the consortium program, but those who want to stay with ComEd must opt out,

It is hoped all the villages in the consortium will choose the same plans, but towns can select different ones if they want, he said.

Residents who attended informational meetings before the March 20 election were very vocal in saying they wanted an option for renewable energy, Shirley said.

The Arlington Heights Village Board held a public hearing Monday at which Ron Vargarson, the only resident to speak, said many residents want the option of choosing renewable energy.

“One hundred percent renewable is a step we must take to keep ourselves in the leadership of providing energy not only for ourselves but our future,” Vargarson said.

The village board will hold a second hearing April 16. Information packets will be sent to residents and small businesses in June, Shirley said. The electricity, which is expected to be less expensive than provided by ComEd, should be delivered in July or August. The contract will probably only run through May 2013.

Arlington Heights is in a consortium to purchase and aggregate energy with Buffalo Grove, Lincolnshire, Long Grove, Palatine, Vernon Hills and Wheeling. Voters in all the villages approved letting their local governments aggregate electricity.

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