How green is your electricity company?

If you're considering switching to a green tariff, or electricity company, so that you can contribute to the fight against climate change, you need to know how green your supplier really is and what will change if you make the switch.

With so many energy companies now fighting for the green pound it's hard work for consumers to sift through the competing claims - is it 'greener', for example, to go with a company that plants a tree for you, one that funds projects in the developing world, or perhaps one who reitres ROC's (whatever they are ....)?

There's one statistic that cuts through the 'fog' of green tariffs providing a no nonsense measure of greenness that cuts to the heart of issue - how much each supplier actually spends building New sources of green energy. After all only new sources of green energy can have an impact on climate change.

Each year Ecotricity publishes this statistic - calculated from independently sourced data for each of the UK's electricity companies. The results are presented in a simple league table, making it easy to directly compare suppliers.

"It's the antidote to the confusion - a direct comparison of who spends what cuts through the spin and hype and shows you what actually changes if you switch supplier, or if you stay where you are"
says Dale Vince OBE, founder of Ecotricity.

This week Ecotricity released the figures for 2006 - they tell quite a story. Companies spending tens of millions on advertising each year, often using images of wind mills, are spending next to nothing on building new sources of green energy. Perhaps more suprising is the performance of the smaller 'greener' independent companies - 2 out of the 3 don't spend anything either!

For the third straight year in a row Ecotricity topped the UK league table with a spend per customer of £275, more than all the other electricity companies, big and small, put together!

This information on who spends how much, has been compiled since 2004 and Ecotricity has now produced a league table showing the average spend over three full years, for all UK suppliers. Three year data provides a smoothing effect for good or bad years,. it is an even better way to judge how green each electricity company really is. And the results? Ecotricity top the table with an average annnual spend of over £400 per customer while second place Scottish Power spent just over £10!

In the last three years, Ecotricity spent, not just more money per customer than all other UK suppliers put together - but ten times more!

Dale Vince commented; "The facts will chill the PR departments of the big six - half of whom, despite featuring windmills prominently in their advertising, don't spend anything at all in a typical year - £0 per customer! There's no excuse either, we can all build new green sources, the difference is commitment. There's a lot of green talk out there, from the big and the small suppliers, but its not matched by actions - its what Greenpeace would call 'Greenwash'.

Although many suppliers simply aren't putting their money where their mouths are the overall picture is reassuring - total investment from all suppliers has almost doubled in the last year - so we're going in the right direction, just not quickly enough!

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About Ecotricity

Ecotricity were the first .green. electricity company in the world, it pioneered the concept of making green electricity available to homes and businesses back in 1995 when climate change was a little known concept. Ecotricity continues to innovate and lead the way in green electricity retail and wind turbine development. Ecotricity believes that only by continuously building new sources of green energy can we make a real impact on UK carbon emissions. By changing where our electricity comes from we can tackle the country.s biggest single source of climate change.

Using existing cables and meters Ecotricity can supply any home or business in mainland UK. It also guarantees to match the standard price of every regional supplier (known as the Big Six) so switching to green energy needn't cost more. Something Ecotricity calls 'green for the price of brown'.

For further media information please contact our Press Office on 01453 769318

press.office@ecotricity.co.uk