by Chris Hayday
Advocates for renewable energy scored a major victory on Election Day. That’s because over 78% of Columbia voters passed a ballot initiative requiring the city to use renewable energy. The proposal calls for the city to incrementally add renewable energy beginning with 2% in 2007; as much as 15% of Columbia’s energy could be from clean renewable energy sources by 2022. Columbians for Clean Energy, whose activists included Sierra Club members, began gathering signatures at Columbia’s Earth Day celebration in April and collected over 3000 signatures by July 2004.The petition required the city council to vote on the proposed ordinance change and after the city council’s deadlocked vote the issue was ultimately placed on the ballot for voters to decide. Columbia currently uses no renewable energy. Columbia voters quickly recognized the benefits of renewable energy and the initiative passed with 78% of the vote.