Kansas interfaith group says: Maintain state renewable standard

“People of faith are called to be responsible stewards of God’s Creation. That’s why Kansas Interfaith Power and Light is one of a number of business, agricultural, energy, environmental and faith-based groups supporting the most effective state policy we have for the development of clean energy in Kansas: the renewable portfolio standard.”

That’s the word from Rabbi Moti Rieber, director of Kansas Interfaith Power & Light, in an opinion article in yesterday’s edition of the Wichita (Kans.) Eagle urging support for the state’s renewable portfolio standard (RPS).

Kansas’s RPS currently requires some utilities to obtain 20 percent of the electricity they sell from renewable energy sources by the year 2020. Wind power has been a smashing success in the Sunflower State, which finished 2012 ranked 8th in the nation with 2,712 MW installed, according to AWEA’s 4th Quarter 2012 Market Report.

An effort is currently underway in the state legislature, however, to weaken the RPS. That would be a bad idea, Rabbi Rieber warns, noting the considerable benefits that flow from the standard, including “increased diversity and security of our energy supply; reduced volatility of power prices; local economic development resulting from new jobs, taxes and revenue; and environmental improvement as we move away from polluting forms of energy toward cleaner and safer ones.” He calls on Kansans to let their legislators know that the RPS is a successful policy that is “good for Creation, and … Kansas.”

Kansas IPL is one of 37 statewide affiliates of national Interfaith Power & Light and is under the fiscal sponsorship of Ecumenical Christian Ministries of Lawrence, Kans. It has a 12-person Steering Committee consisting of representatives from many different faith groups from throughout the state.