In September 2008, George W. Bush was president, the dominant fuel source for U.S. electricity generation was coal, and the Paris Agreement was seven years away. Much has changed in the commonwealth and the country since Grid spoke with The Energy Co-op for our first issue. Founded in 1979 by members of Weavers Way Food
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Winners Take All by Katie Bohri Restaurants create a lot of waste. There’s food waste, and the wasted fossil fuels that go into keeping a full menu available year-round. But there’s also a waste of human energy: the energy that workers must spend to manage the stress imposed by an industry that pits employees against
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Diane Childs has been a member of credit unions for 46 years. “My parents got me my first savings account as a child, and I have continued to do my banking only at credit unions,” she explains. Her long-time membership inspired her to eventually become an employee at Sb1 Federal Credit Union. “Knowing that we
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Drinking & Riding by Justin Klugh Philadelphia has no shortage of home brewers. But not every tech specialist, contractor or middle school teacher who goes home to a distillery in their garage has the know-how of commercial business to take the next step in a crowded craft beer universe. “How do I do that without
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“I like talking to farmers about their work and seeing the seasons change through our produce selection,” says Bull Gervasi, facilities and produce department coordinator for Mariposa Foods, a cooperative grocery store in West Philadelphia. Gervasi has been a Mariposa Co-op member for 18 years because he believes co-ops are the least exploitative business model
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Plugging Into Community by Justin Klugh Shopping for anything when you have too many choices can mean not making a choice at all. That’s one thing when you’re roaming the grocery store. But when it comes to energy for our homes, many of us are not yet used to having a choice, much less understanding
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“I love the feeling of taking part in a movement instead of going at it alone,” says Lauren Nagy, who co-founded the community farm Cooperative 518 with her fiancé in 2013. “We wanted to give our friends and peers a chance to be an equal in our vision,” she explains. That vision was to turn
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Nelson Camp has lived at the intentional community Bryn Gweled in Upper Southampton since 1992. “Our house was built by my in-laws after the second World War, so in a sense, the same family has lived here since the mid-’40s,” he says. The community at Bryn Gweled functions as a cooperative, but the community owns
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There are 30,000 cooperatives in the United States with over 120 million members, nearly one in three Americans, yet most of us don’t understand the basics of this business model, even if we’re buying from them. Anyone who has ever picked up a jar of Ocean Spray juice or went camping with gear bought by
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