Wonderful. I've spent years researching how I can buy clean power, but I only recently discovered that I can get clean power through Dominion. They never once volunteered that information. There's no information on their website or the state's website. It's really asking very little for them to provide a sentence or two on the bills description clean power options.

What a shame that this failed. I'd love to know the logic behind its defeat. I assume that it's because Del. Vanderhye is a freshman Democrat in a Republican body. Because this bill would cost utilities virtually nothing to implement, and, frankly, it's the very least that they can do.

I notice the vote tally was almost cleanly along party lines. Only Mark Sickles (D-43) joined the Republicans in opposing.

Well, this bill has been revived from the dead. I'd say that it's been amended, but it's actually been entirely rewritten. There are some significant differences.

Notices only have to go out quarterly, not monthly. And utilities don't have to explain how to purchase energy from renewable sources, but only have to provide information about how to learn that, in the form of a phone number or a website address.

There may be other differences between the two, but I'm not smart enough to figure them out. One way or another, though, I'm glad that this bill is alive and out of committee.

A caution when looking for sources of renewable energy is that some forms of "renewable energy" can be extremely destructive. For example, relatively small industrial-scale wind facilities in WV and PA are killing many thousands of bats every year. These small mammals produce only one or two offspring a year so this kind of mortality is unsustainable. It is important to remember that bats are the primary consumers of night flying insects and help protect farms, forests and human health by keeping insect populations in check. Hopefully a means of preventing this unsustainable mortality will be discovered but as of now there is no proven method and many operators of the wind projects have closed their facilities to further research. Those who want to contribute to the ecosystem health should carefully research the choices they support.