In Washington State, where I live, there is a ballot initiative (I937) to require mid-sized and larger utilities to get at least 15 percent of their power from renewable resources by 2020.

See the Yes on 1-937 page, a Seattle Times article, Does clean energy initiative promise more than it delivers dated today, and the No on I-937 page. Oops - there isn't one, at least not easily visible. The closest I could find was opposition from the Marysville/Tulalip Chamber of Commerce. It made me feel good that there's at least less organized opposition than organized support (a Google search reveals a lot of support).

I'm generally leery of initiatives, but I hope this one is supported. Sure, it probably has some problems, but it's a step in the right direction. Initiatives from the people to drive cleaner energy are a good thing in this day of lackluster federal attention to the same subject.

If any of you out there know of similar initiatives in your states, I'd be interested in hearing about them.

On the small choices front, I dropped our clothes off at a green cleaners today. Tough choice, actually, since I've been using the same dry cleaner for years and we have a great business relationship. They know me by name and get our clean clothes out and ready when my car pulls up. I'm just hoping these new folks do a good job. But I figure I need to change even more things I like to really get better at this. Today, I noticed out washer has an energy sticker on it that suggests it uses way closer to the "most" possible energy than the least. Budget says wait on that after the 25K worth of energy efficient windows we just ordered. But I'll start researching soon.