Joel and Jean McCormack: Just do it! – Boulder Daily Camera

Custom Solar's Houston Sherer works to install solar panels on a home on in Boulder last year. (Jeremy Papasso / Staff Photographer)

Whether you support or oppose Boulder's effort to municipalize electricity, it will be years before Boulder or Xcel substantially increase renewable energy sources. The Trump administration seems to think that limiting carbon emissions causes leprosy. Neither of those prevents you from reducing your own carbon footprint right now.

First and easiest, consider subscribing to Xcel's WindSource program. The additional cost is now less than a penny per kilowatt-hour (kWh). If you use 800 kWh/month, that's about $7.00. Sure, you could refuse to sign up, protesting that Xcel shouldn't be charging extra for cheap wind power. We agree, they shouldn't. But you might feel better if you get up smiling every morning, knowing that for a whopping 25 cents, your electricity that day won't consume an ounce of fossil fuel.

You might install solar panels ours provide almost all our electricity, including charging two cars. Prices have plummeted with increased manufacturing volume, federal tax credits knock another 30 percent off, and most installers offer leases or loans. Your actions may encourage others, as research shows that solar panels tend to blossom in a neighborhood. Evidently, neighbors look up and think "Hey, why don't we do that?"

If you have the space, you can install solar water heating. These systems heat water with panels on your roof, then return it to a storage tank that feeds your hot water heater. Our installation lowers our propane use substantially in winter, and provides nearly all our hot water in summer.

If you're buying a new car, consider going electric. We bought a Tesla nearly four years ago, and our only regret is that we didn't buy a bunch of Tesla stock at the same time. We've taken it as far as Steamboat, with a quick stop to charge in Silverthorne. If you drive far every day, you'll want a Tesla or a Chevrolet Bolt; both go over 200 miles on a charge. Electric vehicles qualify for a federal tax credit of $7,500, and a Colorado state credit of $5,000. In the past, Nissan and Xcel have offered additional incentives on Leafs, which explains why they seem to be the "new Prius" in Boulder.

Even Tesla's supercharging isn't as fast as a gas station, so you may want to own or rent another car for long trips. Alternatively, a plug-in hybrid gives you some electric operation before switching over to gasoline. We just replaced our ailing 17-year-old Toyota Prius with a new Prius Prime. It gets about 25 miles on a charge, then over 50 mpg on gas. Our younger son sometimes drives as far as Denver for work, yet went 1,700 miles on the first tank of gas. A friend loves his Chevy Volt plug-in, which has twice the electric range. The Prius Prime qualifies for a $4,500 federal credit; the Volt, with its larger battery, gets $7,500. Both qualify for the $5,000 state credit. That makes it cheaper to buy a Prius Prime than an ordinary Prius hybrid!

Finally, a hybrid can keep you from descending all the way to the consumption of an all-gasoline car. We've averaged 31 mpg with an all-wheel-drive Toyota RAV4 hybrid, even after a winter with snow tires and ski rack, and a summer with our older son blasting the air conditioning. Toyota charges just $700 over the non-hybrid. At $2.50 per gallon of gas, and 12,000 miles/year, that pays for itself in under four years, which is a far better return than the 0.000005 percent or so interest most banks will pay you.

In short, whatever your thoughts about municipalization, you can personally move faster and farther toward a carbonless future, just by changing a few purchasing decisions.

Joel and Jean McCormack live in Boulder.

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Joel and Jean McCormack: Just do it! - Boulder Daily Camera