News
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Reinventing the Incandescent Lightbulb
By Magen Howard For the first time in more than 100 years, the basic incandescent lightbulb is getting a facelift. To accommodate new energy efficiency standards set by Congress (which require lightbulbs to be more efficient starting in 2012), a new generation of incandescent lightbulbs has entered the marketplace. These products boast energy savings of 25 percent and a lifespan up to three times longer than their soon-to-be extinct predecessors. “Up to 12 percent of a typical monthly electric bill pays for lighting, so removing energy-wasting bulbs from the market will have a big impact on America’s energy use,” explains […]
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Insulating Your Attic: More is Better
Is there enough insulation in your attic? By adding insulation, you can improve your home’s energy efficiency and save money. Here’s a tip from the electric cooperatives of Tennessee that can help reduce your energy consumption—and your electric bills. With adequate attic insulation, your home’s heating/cooling system will operate more efficiently. It will keep you cooler in the summer and warmer in winter—and it will keep more money in your wallet. As TogetherWeSave.com has shown, adding insulation to your attic can save you $240 a year. Older homes tend to have less attic insulation than newer ones. An energy audit […]
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Nature’s choice
by Tom Purkey, Executive Vice President and General Manager for the Tennessee Electric Cooperative Association If you live in West Tennessee, you probably didn’t experience it this year. And if you live in East Tennessee, you may not have experienced it either. But the folks in Middle Tennessee sure got an earful of it this spring. It was irritable but quite interesting. It made you want to stay in your car or your house, but it was one of nature’s spectacular events. If you were like me, you might have even occasionally cracked your car window just to hear the […]
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New faces, old challenges
by Tom Purkey, Executive Vice President and General Manager for the Tennessee Electric Cooperative Association In early May, I joined in Washington, D. C., more than 2,000 electric cooperative leaders from across the country to deliver messages to Congress about the issues that are important to our electric consumers. While this is an annual event, it was especially important to visit our representatives this year, considering the numerous newly elected members in Congress. Spending and debt are dominating the attention of Congress. Legislators are focusing on how to deal with mounting federal deficits and a national debt that is at […]
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Pole Attachment Bill Fails
With the help of a strong grassroots push, co-ops in Virginia defeated legislation that would have subjected them to new state regulations on pole attachments and provided a windfall to telecommunications and cable companies. House and Senate committees in the Virginia General Assembly tabled bills backed by cable interests that would have curtailed co-ops’ ability to negotiate with providers on attachment terms, and capped fees they can charge for attachments to utility poles. Instead, the State Corporation Commission will conduct a study of the issue, with participation from all stakeholders, and report to the legislature in November. “It’s definitely a […]