P’lovers the Environmental Store (Port Perry)

I find it staggering that in 2008, a large percentage of the power we use in Ontario comes from coal-fired generating stations. Yes, that’s right, coal — the same stuff used to power steam locomotives over a century ago!

One of the challenges of running any business, and in particular a planet-friendly business like P’lovers is managing energy usage. We take measures to conserve as much as we can, however, in reality, it simply takes a lot of energy to run a business. (I try to minimize my heart palpitations by keeping the steam locomotive analogy out of my mind as much as possible.)

When building your own off-grid renewable system is not an option, then Bullfrog Power is most definitely the solution. P’lovers home office has been Bullfrog Powered for a couple of years, however, our retail store only hopped on the lillypad this month.

Bullfrog has a beautifully simple business model. Customers pay a small premium to invest in power from clean, emissions-free sources like wind power and low-impact water power instead of environmentally damaging sources like coal, oil, gas, or nuclear.

The switch was easy, seamless, and surprisingly inexpensive. Since P’lovers is part of Queen Street Commons, a shared-use facility, I had always assumed it would be difficult to transition to Bullfrog.

Boy, was I wrong. I already have an accurate calculation of our energy use compared to the whole building. All my Bullfrog contact needed was our recent hydro bills and that simple energy use calculation. Within a few hours, I had a quote in my inbox for slightly less than $17/month.

I was astounded! For such a trivial sum, I could offset every killowatt of energy we use with clean, green, renewable energy! Not only is Bullfrog an amazing investment in the future of our planet, but it is also buying me piece-of-mind. That, is a pretty good purchase as far as I’m concerned!

-Steve

(Editors Note: The Ontario Clean Air Alliance has been campaigning for years to eliminate coal from our energy supply mix. Visit their website for a wealth of excellent information on the topic.)