BRUNSWICK – Bowdoin College has announced a three-year agreement to purchase renewable energy certificates from the owner of the Mars Hill wind farm in northern Maine.

The purchases are intended to offset the use of nonrenewable energy as part of the college’s effort to become carbon-neutral.

Bowdoin says it now is offsetting about 70 percent of the electricity use on the Brunswick campus with voluntary renewable energy certificates produced in Maine.

The 42-megawatt Mars Hill project was developed by Massachusetts-based UPC Wind and is the only utility-scale wind farm operating in New England. The company is moving ahead with other wind projects in Maine, including a 57-megawatt facility in Danforth.