There is also growing support for implementing a European Union target of doubling the market share of renewables to 12 percent by 2010, with a credit trading system already implemented in the Netherlands. State legislators have recognized its economic development and environmental benefits, while a growing number of federal legislators see it as a way and of supporting an emerging domestic industry and decreasing the expense of reducing greenhouse gases. That means every retail provider and generator of power would need to demonstrate once each year that a portion of the power they provided came from renewables. The fact that environmental and other benefits are not recognized in the cost of power is the starting point for creating a new commodity that represents those benefits. That commodity is the renewable energy credit.
Customers only pay for the electricity.
When a renewable power plant runs, like conventional plants it creates electricity, but unlike them it also creates a reduction of pollution, waste, and risk. When customers buy electricity generated from renewable sources, they pay only for the power and society pays nothing. Renewable energy generators sell cleaner power, but are paid only for power. With renewable energy credits, renewables companies will have a new product that represents the clean. That is, RECs represent all of the renewable energy benefits that electricity markets ignore, including environmental and energy security benefits.