Edison's rooftop solar project powers up

Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times

Solar panels atop ProLogis’ warehouse in Fontana can power about 1,300 homes. The building is the first of 150 that Edison hopes to outfit with panels.

The utility's ratepayer-financed plan to outfit 150 buildings with the panels is cheered by business owners but criticized by consumer activists.

By Marla Dickerson 
December 2, 2008

Southern California Edison on Monday unveiled its newest power plant: 33,700 solar panels atop a warehouse in Fontana that will feed green energy directly into the grid.

It's the first piece of what the utility says could become the largest rooftop solar installation in the world, a swath of photovoltaic panels spanning two square miles.

The 600,000-square-foot warehouse rooftop, owned by logistics firm ProLogis Inc., is the first of 150 commercial buildings that Edison is looking to outfit with solar panels over the next five years. Collectively, solar panels on all those roofs would provide 250 megawatts of electricity, enough by Edison's reckoning to power more than 160,000 homes when the sun is shining.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was on hand to flip a mock switch on the 2-megawatt Fontana system, which cost $10 million and can light about 1,300 homes. 

"I am a fanatic about renewable energy, and I have been trying to push the power companies . . . to create more," said Schwarzenegger, who urged Edison to move even faster on its proposed plan. 

If approved by state regulators, Edison's photovoltaic project would be the largest ever attempted by a U.S. utility; 250 megawatts roughly equals the capacity of all the solar panels manufactured in the United States last year. 

The massive size reflects the pressure California's investor-owned power companies are under to meet state mandates requiring them to boost the use of clean energy. It also underscores an evolution in solar financing. Rather than pay for their own panels, companies such as ProLogis are increasingly leasing out their roofs to utilities or striking long-term power contracts with third parties, which own, install and maintain the panels.

The approach is a hit with business owners who are finding their roofs to be unexpectedly valuable real estate. Urban solar is also popular with environmentalists because it can be linked to existing transmission lines and it transforms barren industrial space into platforms for clean power.

"This is exactly what all the energy companies should be doing," said Terry Weiner, conservation coordinator for the San Diego-based Desert Protective Council. She said the solution to global warming "is right there on the roof."

But not everyone is enamored of Edison's plan. The Rosemead-based utility, a subsidiary of Edison International, wants its customers to pick up the nearly $1-billion tab for the proposed 150-roof project.

Consumer activists object. They say Edison should be looking to cheaper sources of renewable power, such as large solar and wind farms and geothermal plants. They contend that Edison International shareholders, not utility ratepayers, should finance the company's huge bet on photovoltaic rooftop solar, one of the most expensive forms of clean energy.

Edison used so-called thin-film panels on its first rooftop project. Supplied by Tempe, Ariz.-based First Solar Inc., that technology is significantly cheaper than traditional silicon-based solar cells. Still, Edison estimates that electricity from the Fontana facility costs about 27 cents a kilowatt hour, compared with an average of 8 cents a kilowatt hour from conventional generation.

"This is not the most cost-effective renewable they could invest in," said Sepideh Khosrowjah, policy advisor for the Division of Ratepayer Advocates of the California Public Utilities Commission. The independent advocacy operation has asked the commission to reject the ratepayer-financed plan. Others fear that Edison would drive up the cost of solar panels by gobbling a limited supply and that the utility would have an unfair advantage over private-sector solar providers, which don't have a captive group of ratepayers to fund their operations.

"This is a solar monopoly that will eliminate its competition," said Michael Boyd, president of the nonprofit Californians for Renewable Energy Inc., in a filing with utility regulators.

Edison executives said their entry into the market would help to lower solar panel prices for everyone because of economies of scale. The company's big orders would help manufacturers improve designs, increase efficiency and ultimately cut prices, said Ted Craver, chief executive of Edison International.

Edison is complementing, not competing, he said, with the private-sector firms that are thriving under California's existing Million Solar Roofs Initiative. That program provides hefty state incentives to homeowners and businesses that install systems less than 1 megawatt in size. 

Craver said Edison's photovoltaic project aimed to install systems ranging from 1 megawatt to 2 megawatts on commercial rooftops.

"It fills a gap," Craver said.

California law requires Edison, PG&E Corp.'s Pacific Gas & Electric Co. and Sempra Energy's San Diego Gas & Electric Co. to procure at least 20% of their electricity from renewable sources by 2010. Schwarzenegger wants to boost that minimum to 33% by 2020. Edison is currently at 16%.

Edison already is the nation's largest purchaser of solar power with 354 megawatts under contract. Much of that comes from large-scale solar projects located in remote desert areas, which take years to permit and build.

Craver said Edison wanted to add urban rooftop solar to the mix because it can be rolled out rapidly, getting more clean megawatts online sooner. The Fontana project was completed in a few months.

Edison on Monday announced its second rooftop project atop a 458,000-square-foot industrial building in Chino that is slated for completion in early 2009. Craver said it would probably be Edison's last if the state Public Utilities Commission didn't approve its proposal.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-sunroof2-2008dec02,0,3036433.story

City wants new energy plant built near airport, but aviation expertsand others say that could have disastrous consequences

By Michael Burge

UNION-TRIBUNE STAFF WRITER

November 23, 2008

The city of Carlsbad's fight to shift a proposed power plant away from the coast, where the owner wants to build it, to eastern Carlsbad faces a serious obstacle: airplanes.

CHARLIE NEUMAN / Union-Tribune With the Encina Power Station's 400-foot-tall smokestack visible about four miles away, a small private plane came in for a landing at McClellan-Palomar Airport in Carlsbad. Hot exhaust from smokestacks at a power plant proposed for a site near the airport could cause turbulence for planes landing there.

The city's favored site, the Carlsbad Oaks North industrial park in eastern Carlsbad, is within a mile and a half of McClellan-Palomar Airport's runway, posing potential trouble for air navigation. And one of Carlsbad's backup sites, the city's police and fire safety center, is even closer.

Building a power plant near an airport can be dangerous because the stacks would stand 140 feet tall, creating a physical and visual hazard for aircraft. Also, hot exhaust emanating from the stacks could cause turbulence for planes landing at the airport.

“Both of those areas are in the arrival area of light aircraft, where they're descending,” said Ron Cozad, an attorney and regional vice president of the California Pilots Association. “That would be disastrous. It couldn't be done.”

Graphic: Power plant sites

There have been 10 accidents since 2000 involving aircraft taking off or landing at McClellan-Palomar Airport, according to the Federal Aviation Administration. Five were fatal crashes that killed a total of 13 people, FAA spokesman Ian Gregor said.

The National Transportation Safety Board has determined probable causes in six of the 10 accidents. All were the result of pilot error, and weather was a factor in three, Gregor said.

NRG Energy, which owns and operates the 54-year-old, oceanfront Encina Power Station, has applied to the California Energy Commission to build a 540-megawatt plant on its coastal property west of Interstate 5 on the south shore of Agua Hedionda Lagoon. It hopes to have the plant operating by 2011.

The city wants any power plant moved off the coast to an inland location in Carlsbad.

“It all comes down to we don't think the coastline is an appropriate site,” said Joe Garuba, the city's municipal projects manager. “All we're trying to do is point out there's a whole lot of sites that are better than the coast.”

City officials have said the land, with an unobstructed view of the Pacific Ocean, is prime property for a hotel and other developments that would serve the public.

The California Energy Commission – not the city – has authority over issuing permits for power plants. The city can question NRG's data and comment during the application process.

City officials offered two alternative sites – Carlsbad Oaks North and Maerkle Reservoir in the city's northeast – but have since said the reservoir is off the table because it is too close to the Ocean Hills senior community in Oceanside.

Carlsbad Oaks North is a 400-acre business park north of Faraday Avenue and west of Melrose Avenue that is seeking tenants.  NRG has rejected both sites for various reasons.

Tim Hemig, NRG's project manager for the proposed power plant, says the business park falls within a proposed safety zone for the airport where development is limited. The purpose of the zone is to ensure that structures around an airport don't pose hazards to airplanes and people on the ground.  “There's a black-and-white restriction that says no power plant can be sited in (the safety zone),” Hemig said.

Sandi Sawa, manager of airport planning for the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority, which is establishing safety zones around airports, said McClellan-Palomar's zone has not been adopted, so it is not black and white.  “Under current plans, there's no reason a power plant couldn't be allowed there,” Sawa said.

A power plant would have to be approved by the FAA and the California Department of Transportation's aeronautics division, she said.  Gregor said developers hoping to build near airports must apply to the FAA, which determines whether a structure's height would interfere with air navigation.

The FAA has no authority to block developments, but its recommendation carries weight with other agencies that can, he said.  Caltrans' aeronautics division has such authority.  “We may look at it and suggest against it ... if we think it creates a hazard,” said Phillip Miller of Caltrans' aeronautics division.  Miller said the agency would comment on the proposal to the California Energy Commission.

When Caltrans declared that a 180-foot building under construction in Kearny Mesa endangered airplanes flying into Montgomery Field, San Diego City Attorney Michael Aguirre used that as ammunition to force the developer, Sunroad Enterprises, to shave 20 feet off the building's height last year.

NRG points to the California Energy Commission's recent rejection of a proposed power plant in the San Francisco Bay Area, called Eastshore Energy Center, as an example of why it doesn't want to pursue the Carlsbad Oaks North location.  The commission found that hot exhaust from the proposed plant would have been hazardous to planes landing at nearby Hayward Executive Airport.

Carol Gold, vice president of the California Pilots Association, said that because of the heavy air traffic around Hayward – Oakland International Airport is to the north and San Francisco International to the west – planes have limited airspace. Any attempt to go around the power plant would have forced them into another airport's traffic pattern.  “You can't avoid it by flying above,” Gold said.

Hemig said NRG has determined that a plume from its power plant could go as high as 1,700 feet, and planes fly at a lower altitude near the Carlsbad Oaks North industrial park, creating a hazard.  Garuba said the energy commission's Eastshore Energy Center ruling doesn't apply to Carlsbad.  He said another, larger power plant was approved within a mile of Eastshore and that pilots had to avoid the plant. That left no other space for airplanes to go if Eastshore was built.  “They're boxed in,” which is not the case with McClellan-Palomar Airport, Garuba said.

Peter Drinkwater, director of airports for San Diego County, which owns and operates McClellan-Palomar, said a new power plant near the airport would require close scrutiny.  “One thing for certain is if something gets built and it affects the flight path, then one thing that can mitigate (it) is a change in the flight path or pattern, or the approaches,” Drinkwater said. “But those things obviously cause other problems.”

Some residents who live near the airport complain that planes fly over their homes, and the airport tells pilots to avoid residences to minimize the noise. Many residents say that doesn't take care of the problem.  Garuba said the city contacted the FAA this year about aviation issues regarding a proposed power plant.  “That was one of the first things we did, and ruled out stuff” based on that contact, Garuba said.  He said there is enough space around Carlsbad Oaks North to mitigate the possible impacts.

Cozad, of the pilots association, said he doesn't see how the city's chosen site can get off the ground.  “This is a very scary issue,” he said. “You just don't put a power plant at the arrival end of an airport.”

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/northcounty/20081123-9999-lz1mc23power.html

Financial Post

Walking the green walk

If there's a municipal job that marries a city's green talk and its green action, it's that of Chicago's Chief Environmental Officer.

LINDA GYULAI, The Gazette Published: Saturday, November 29, 2008

JOHN KENNEY GAZETTE FILE PHOTOPerformance artists Christine Brault (left) and Thérèse Chabot tour the green roof on the Côte des Neiges Maison de la culture with Montreal Mayor Gérald Tremblay in June 2007, when the garden officially ...

As CEO of the third largest city in the United States, Sadhu Johnston is responsible for implementing Mayor Richard M. Daley's environmental initiatives across city government.

"My role is to bring the department of environment into each department," Johnston, who is also the mayor's deputy chief of staff, has said of his job.

Similarly, in Calgary, the role of spurring environmental action across city government belongs to Dave Day, the city's director of environmental and safety management.

Day leads a team of 60 people who oversee green programs and targets for municipal departments under the city's internationally-certified environmental management system.

"I'm the environmental champion for the city," Day says.

Unlike Chicago and Calgary, Montreal has no civil servant perched atop the municipal bureaucracy making sure the green tint runs to its core.  So while Montreal has a new 20-year transportation plan aimed at boosting public transit and decreasing car use, it's moving ahead with a redesign of Notre Dame St. E. that's expected to increase the number of cars and trucks using it.

And while the city has raised its annual contribution to bus and métro service by 40 per cent, or $95 million, since 2002 to woo riders, it has hit riders with the other hand by hiking the price of a monthly transit pass by 40 per cent, or $20, in the same period.

To its credit, Montreal has developed green bylaws restricting pesticides and car idling, built a park over a former landfill in St. Michel and has become a leader in soil decontamination.  But the city and its 19 boroughs also engage in contradictory actions, critics say, leading them to conclude that Montreal is rudderless on the eco wave.

What if someone in Montreal's community of 23,000 civil servants were a designated eco chief, forcing Montreal to improve its green record? Imagine the progress that could be made in transit, building, pollution and waste management.  "We have lots of policies in Montreal, but it's not all coherent with what the city is doing," André Porlier, executive director of the Conseil régional de l'environnement de Montréal, said.

For Porlier, the city's most maddening contradiction is on green-space protection.  On the one hand, Montreal has a four-year-old policy for preserving natural habitats, which targets protecting six per cent of the island's land mass and two per cent of waterways.  On the other hand, Rivière des Prairies-Pointe aux Trembles borough voted last year to build a borough office and cultural centre in René Masson Park, an area comprised of marshland, a creek, mature trees and fields. Ironically, construction will incorporate Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) guidelines.

And Côte des Neiges-Notre Dame de Grâce voted last year to raze several hundred square-metres of green space to replace an outdoor pool in Benny Park with a new LEED-standard indoor sports and community centre.

CRE-Montréal helped the city prepare its 2005 sustainable development plan, and devised 20 indicators to help a cell of five civil servants in the city's environment department track progress by the city and its 160 business and community "partners" on the plan's 36 goals.  But nothing requires the city or boroughs to attain those goals, Porlier said with frustration in his voice. "You need a concerted effort, and we don't have that right now in Montreal."  

Elsewhere, many cities have internalized the need to do, and not just tell others to do.  Cities are combining environmental sustainability with economic development, compelling their employees to take environmental considerations into account when making decisions, whether it's about a local park or a bid to redevelop a neighbourhood, and weighing what they can do to reduce their use of fossil fuels and conserve energy.

This urgent change is economically advantageous as well as the right thing to do.  Indeed, a look at several cities that are on the environmental forefront reveals they've done it by adopting an environmental management system, or EMS.

Under EMS, a city develops an environmental plan linked to organizational goals for each municipal department. A person or group in the civil service is put in charge of developing programs and targets, measuring progress and correcting shortcomings. Those eco chiefs report directly to the mayor or council.

Some, such as Calgary, have achieved ISO 14001 certification, the EMS standard of the International Organization for Standardization.  Day, who became Calgary's first environmental director five years ago, has a network of environmental coordinators working within departments to apply programs and targets and to pass the units' results back to Day.

He, in turn, reports regularly to administrative directors on the city's environmental performance and reports directly to city council four times a year.  City council sets policy, and Day and his team figure out how to make it happen.

Say the council decides to target improving air quality.  "What are the methods we would use to carry that policy out?" Day said.  "Are we going to reduce our use of hydrocarbons, (or) are we going to work with people to increase public transit?"

Each of 12 units working within the city's seven departments have to come up with ways to support the methods, and Day then develops a plan and measurement criteria. Department directors are accountable for their units' results.  If targets aren't met, the units have to explain why and revise their plan accordingly, Day said.

As required by ISO 14001 standards, Calgary contracts external firms specialized in evaluating such systems to audit each unit's management system. Calgary also has an internal whistle-blower line for staff. And it has an internal investigation process for policy breaches.

"Most international systems for effective management for things like environmental risk and safety are not meant to be punitive," Day said.  "They're meant more to keep you on the ball." 

Sydney, Australia, also has an environmental management system compliant with ISO 14001, as does Scottsdale, AZ. And Aalborg, Denmark, where the Charter of European Cities and Towns Towards Sustainability was signed in 1994, is ISO 14001 compliant and also adheres to a voluntary environmental management standard set by the European Union.

In Seattle, WA, which launched EMS in 1999, the Office of Sustainability and Environment reports directly to the mayor's office.  City departments in Seattle also sign an accountability agreement with the mayor's office, in which they undertake to achieve the goals of the city's 2006 Environmental Action Agenda on climate change, as well as goals in other programs related to redeveloping neighbourhoods and building new infrastructure.

San Jose, CA, certified ISO 14001 in 2006, has a sustainability office with a staff of about 12. It, too, has a direct pipeline into the mayor's office.

And when San Jose adopted a 15-year Green Vision in 2007 to turn the city into a world hub of "clean technology" innovation, it set up an implementation committee of civil servants to meet weekly. It also created a steering committee of city directors who meet monthly with the mayor to provide progress reports and ask for regulatory changes to help the city meet its targets.

In Chicago, Mayor Daley created the CEnO, one of the first such positions in a U.S. city, in August 2007.  Johnston has created an accountability system for city departments that includes an environmental scorecard that tracks performance in the areas of energy, air, land, water and waste.

And Johnston, who previously held posts as Chicago's commissioner of environment and the mayor's assistant on green initiatives, is advised by a Green Steering Committee of civil servants who recommend short- and long-term green initiatives.

Montreal city councillor Alan DeSousa, who is responsible for sustainable development on the city executive committee, is the closest Mayor Gérald Tremblay has to a CEnO.  However, DeSousa also juggles the economic development portfolio and major urban development projects on the executive committee, the city's highest decision-making body. He's also borough mayor of St. Laurent, and a member of city council.

And the environment file is divided with committee colleague Helen Fotopulos, who handles waterways and nature parks.

Interest in environmental management is building in Montreal, albeit with tentative steps.  This week, the Montreal Metropolitan Community, representing 82 cities, voted to contribute $100,000 to a $300,000 fund being started by the province to spur a "clean-tech" sector in the region.

Risk capital invested in Quebec firms working on water purification, waste management and other clean-technology areas shot from $17 million in 2006 to $59 million in 2007, the MMC says.  DeSousa adds that he has a steering committee brainstorming on the next phase of the sustainable development plan.

And he says the environment department now has an internal environmental management system "inspired by" ISO 14001. A progress report in May noted 60 actions taken at Crémazie Blvd. city offices, such as a green purchasing policy, battery recycling and car-sharing service for staff between the office and parking lots at transit stations.  Still, he said he wasn't aware of the results until this week.

And DeSousa's environmental arm doesn't stretch into the 19 boroughs - they're autonomous.  He defends Montreal's decentralized system, saying the "one size fits all" formula of other cities wouldn't suit Montreal.  "You have to respect the local particularities," he said. Some boroughs, he added, experiment with environmental initiatives.

Still, Porlier finds the city's approach timid and incoherent. Montreal needs someone to set quantifiable targets for the boroughs and the city departments and to exact results, he said.

"What it takes," he said, "is political will."

- - -

ECO-WIZARDS: What other cities are doing

GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS

Calgary: City's departments have already reduced their greenhouse gases by 44 per cent. Goal is 50 per cent by 2012. Community target to reduce emissions by 30 per cent by 2030.

Chicago: Unveiled plan in September to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25 per cent from its 1990 level - the baseline of the Kyoto protocol - by 2020.

Kansas City: Goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30 per cent by 2020.

Sydney, Australia: Goal to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 70 per cent by 2050, based on 1990 levels; and by 70 per cent by 2030, based on 2006 level.

SOLAR/WIND POWER

Calgary: 75 per cent of electricity in municipal buildings is produced by 85-MegaWatt wind farm built by the city-owned utility company. Target is 90 per cent by 2012. May shoot for 100 per cent.

Solar hot-water program for residents to start next year.

Chicago: Installed solar thermal panels on 26 city-owned or operated facilities, such as police and fire stations, to heat water. Park facilities and bus shelters to be outfitted next.

Dallas: 40 per cent of municipal power in 2008 purchased from renewable energy sources - primarily wind.

Sydney, Australia: Using green power - renewable energy from the sun, wind, water and waste - to light up New Year's Eve celebrations since 2004 and committed to municipal buildings using 100-per-cent green power in short term.

WATER

Calgary: Sells rain barrels to residents at discount.

Bylaw limits sale of anything but low-flow toilets.

Chicago: Since 2004, the city's rain barrel program has distributed over 5,200 barrels at a discount to residents - residents use rainwater collected in the barrels to water lawns.

PUBLIC WORKS

Calgary: City builds retention ponds, or bioswales, by roadside by shaping land to hold water so it can infiltrate. Create engineered wetlands in some bioswales using plants that filter pollutants from the water.

Chicago: Using recycled construction debris in asphalt and concrete mixes for residential road building and up to 50 per cent in concrete for sidewalks.

Installed 374 recycled speed bumps in alleys in 2005 and 225 more in 2006.

Green Alley Program uses permeable pavement allowing water to be absorbed by the soil - helps keep water out of the city's combined sewer and stormwater system to prevent back-up and flooding.

Light-coloured reflective pavement is used to reflect sunlight instead of absorbing it to reduce urban heat island effect.

In 2009, the city will build sustainable street, with permeable pavement, bioswales (broad vegetated channel used to move water and absorb runoff), stormwater and rainwater irrigation, energy-efficient lighting and solar-powered pay-and-display parking meter boxes.

BUILDINGS

Calgary: Organic waste collection in municipal buildings.

LEED Gold standards for all new municipal buildings and trying for LEED Gold for older buildings when renovated.

Chicago: Has about 200 LEED certified and registered projects, including several libraries.

Over the past two years, city and partners distributed more than one million energy-saving compact fluorescent light bulbs.

Green roof planted on Chicago city hall in 2000. It's over 2,000 square-metres with more than 150 plant types and beehives to harvest honey. City has given grants for 300 private green roofs.

A 10-hectare public park was built on a green roof above an underground parking garage.

Dallas: Expects to complete construction of 25 green facilities by 2010, including 10 libraries, seven police and fire stations, a cultural centre, three recreation centres.

San Jose: Requires municipal buildings over 10,000 square feet to be built according to LEED Silver certification as a minimum. Goal to attain LEED Gold or Platinum certification.

FLEET

Calgary: All garbage and recycling trucks run on biodiesel and some fire trucks; 180 hybrid cars and light trucks, including cars for city building inspectors; plans to add electric vehicles.

Chicago: 113 hybrid vehicles; purchasing 50 bicycles for city employees to use.

Dallas: 41 per cent of municipal fleet of 2,000 cars and trucks run on alternative fuel.

Kansas City: All city diesel vehicles use biodiesel and about 225 vehicles run on compressed natural gas.

Scottsdale, Arizona: All diesel-fuel vehicles and nine trolleys operate on biodiesel; 123 Bi-Fuel vehicles run on compressed natural gas and gasoline.

CHEMICALS

Calgary: Internal "sustainable, ethical and environmental" purchasing policy for everything from buying pencils to trucks. Principles are zero environmental impact and not supporting sweat shops wherever in the world the products are made.

Municipal buildings use "green" cleaning products.

San Jose: Environmental procurement policy for city buildings - including items like compostable utensils, paper with minimum content of recyclable material.

Might ban hand soaps containing triclosan, an antibacterial agent, in city buildings.

lgyulai@thegazette.canwest.com

Read about Montreal's sustainable development policy at ville.montreal.qc.ca/developpementdurable

http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=1008937

S.F. supervisors kill mayor's power plant plan

Marisa Lagos, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

The future of San Francisco's energy production was thrown into doubt Tuesday when the Board of Supervisors adamantly refused to give Mayor Gavin Newsom the authority to negotiate and execute a plan to retrofit a polluting power plant on Potrero Hill.

IMAGES

Newsom hopes to retrofit the 40-year-old Mirant Potrero Power Plant from a diesel-fueled polluter into a cleaner plant powered by natural gas, but several supervisors insist that the plant be closed, torn down and replaced by a new, cleaner, city-owned facility.

On Tuesday, the board made its point clear by bringing back the measure, which it had tabled several weeks ago, to kill it more resolutely. The supervisors could have left it tabled to die.

Now it's not clear where city officials will go from here: The existing plant must remain open until an alternative of some sort is built, because the city is required to be able to produce enough energy to handle emergencies or shutdowns of plants elsewhere.

Meanwhile, neighbors of the plant - owned by Mirant Corp. - have worked for years to shutter the facility, which is blamed for numerous health problems in the area.

Several supervisors argued Tuesday that there was no reason to bring the measure back to the floor, but Supervisor Sophie Maxwell, whose district includes the plant, said she wanted to send a strong statement and preserve the board's role in any future decisions.

"The issue is that this resolution takes away the board's ability to comment any further on the retrofit," she said. "The board's input is extremely important, especially to my constituents - people expect me not to sign that away."

Until recently, the mayor and the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission, which regulates the plant, supported the plan to replace the Mirant plant with a newer facility. But they changed their minds this summer, saying it didn't make sense to build a new fossil-fuel burning facility when renewable energy sources are gaining ground.

Maxwell and other supervisors balked at the change, pointing out that they have been working with city officials and the community for years on a plan to close the plant. They also question whether the retrofit will actually lead to acceptable emission reductions.

Meanwhile, several supervisors who are generally allies of the mayor questioned why the board brought the measure back at all. Supervisors Sean Elsbernd and Michela Alioto-Pier said they would have rather left it tabled. They voted against the resolution, however.

Newsom's office struck a conciliatory tone after the vote Tuesday.

Spokesman Nathan Ballard said the mayor remains opposed to replacing the existing plant with other, polluting plants.

"However, he does want to work closely with Supervisor Sophie Maxwell and the Board of Supervisors to find the best solution to this problem," he said.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/11/26/BAPM14C7CE.DTL

Christian Science Monitor

Green homes: solar vs. energy efficiency

Solar gets more subsidies, but home energy efficiency may be more cost-effective.

By Ben Arnoldy| Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor/ November 26, 2008 edition

Ben Arnoldy / The Christian Science Monitor

Sustainable Spaces also uses a ‘smoke candle’ to test for drafts and leaks.

---

Reporter Ben Arnoldy talks about the benefits of a home energy audit.

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SAN FRANCISCO

When Ted and Astrid Olsson set out to cut their home electricity bill, they had three strong incentives to buy solar panels: federal, state, and city subsidies. But they shelved the idea in favor of insulating the attic of their San Francisco Victorian.

While it’s not as sexy as a rooftop rack of silicon, improving a home’s energy efficiency tends to be the more cost-effective way to trim carbon emissions. So why are politicians showering subsidies on residential solar instead?

That’s the question posed by Matt Golden, president of Sustainable Spaces, a company specializing in optimizing the energy performance of homes. He convinced the Olssons to think first about energy efficiency, but with every new solar subsidy, it gets harder for him to get homeowners’ attention and contracts.

Policymakers say energy efficiency doesn’t have out-of-the-box solutions that are easy to mandate or incentivize. Mr. Golden’s message: Try harder, or forget about meeting greenhouse-gas goals.

“Everybody strategically understands that energy efficiency is the most cost-effective place for us to spend our capital,” says Golden. “We can’t afford just to take all these [super-inefficient] houses and put really big solar systems on them that require massive rebates and incentives from the government.”

Among the states, California is furthest along in understanding its emission sources and setting specific cuts. Homes account for roughly one-third of the electricity and natural-gas consumption in California – most of it in older homes. By 2020, the state wants to cut existing home energy consumption by 40 percent.

To get there, California has incentives for both energy efficiency and rooftop solar. But it’s the solar initiative that’s gotten the buzz, helped in part by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger packaging it as the “Million Solar Roofs” plan. The program discounts piggyback on a federal tax credit of up to 30 percent of a system’s cost. San Francisco residents can get another $3,000 to $6,000 written off.
Stoking demand for solar can be good for energy efficiency, too, notes Molly Sterkel of the California Solar Initiative, the state’s solar incentive program.

“[I]t’s a two-way street. Solar gets some people excited about energy consumption and drives them to do energy efficiency. And I think a lot of people get energy efficiency and they still want to do more, and so they go do solar,” says Ms. Sterkel.

Ted and Astrid Olsson talked with half a dozen solar installers before a colleague advised getting a home energy audit first.

On a recent weekend, Golden and a two-man team walked with the Olssons around their four-story home. Golden’s team are like plumbers for air. Using smoke candles, they watch how air circulates through ducts and drains out of vents, and look for bottlenecks and leaks. Using a fan device known as a blower door, they  measure how airtight the building is.

The average home is leaky – lots of energy goes out of windows, doors, or walls. Two percent of all the energy used in California is lost from bad ducts alone.

The Olssons’ audit revealed, among other things, that their attic hemorrhages heat. The audit prioritized retrofits based on return on investment, helping the couple decide to insulate the attic and hold off on other fixes.

“Even with all the incentives offered [for solar], it pays me more to solve my problem by retrofitting the house,” says Mr. Olsson.

Energy officials say they want homeowners to make such rational assessments, but audits cost several hundred dollars and fixes can be time-consuming. That makes it tricky to agree on when and how homeowners should be pushed into the process.

One obvious moment: when a house goes up for sale. The California Assembly passed legislation requiring audit and repairs at a home’s time of sale, but it died in a Senate committee.

“It frankly would create a lot of green jobs as you have people moving into that sector, but the realtors … don’t like it because they think it gets in the way of the transaction,” says Bill Pennington, manager of buildings and appliances at the California Energy Commission.

Getting real estate agents to add an energy-efficiency rating in the database of homes for sale would dramatically boost awareness of energy audits. The ratings would act like an auto fuel-efficiency sticker for homes, says Golden.

Proposals to pair home energy audits and retrofits with solar installations have raised concerns with the solar industry. It would mean consumers have to get separate contractors, says Sue Kateley, head of the California Solar Energy Industries Association. “It’s really good for the consumer to do [energy efficiency] first, but the timing is really difficult to overcome.”
Golden, who emphasizes he isn’t anti-solar, says efficiency upgrades and solar should be paired. “We play in the same sandbox. When [policymakers] pull the lever, they are not only helping solar, they are hurting energy efficiency.”

He says retrofits don’t have to hold up a solar sale: Require the audit upfront, install the solar system, and give consumers a year to make efficiency upgrades.

Sterkel of the solar initiative worries the proposal would increase installers’ paperwork and delay collection of state rebates. Ultimately, she says, her priority is to drive up demand for solar so as to bring down its price.

The utilities commission is asking for public input about whether to scale back its solar subsidies after Congress extended federal solar tax credits recently.

“If we are ever going to meet our carbon goals … existing buildings have to be tackled somehow. And so integration of energy efficiency and [rooftop solar] has to happen,” says Andrew McAllister, director of the California Center for Sustainable Energy.

http://features.csmonitor.com/environment/2008/11/26/green-homes-solar-vs-energy-efficiency/

Higher power

What if some nuns in Wrentham decided to put up a wind turbine? And then high school officials in Worcester? And a Canton bank chairman? And pretty soon, the question wasn't where do wind farms belong, but how many windmills can we squeeze in to every last available space? That day is coming.

By Keith O'Brien

November 30, 2008

Down a gravel road, past a weathered, one-armed statue of St. Joseph somewhere near the Franklin-Wrentham town line, there is a field, a nun, and a dream. The nun, 52-year-old Sister Mariann Garrity, moves gingerly through the waist-high grass in a black veil and bright white New Balance sneakers. This way, she beckons, and keeps going.

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She and the other 49 nuns who stay at Mount St. Mary's Abbey in Wrentham practice silence and simplicity. They awake every morning to pray at 3:20 and pray together another six times throughout the day. They wear traditional black and white nun's habits and, for the most part, forsake modern-day gadgets like cellphones and iPods. The last time the nuns even allowed themselves to watch television was seven years ago: September 11, 2001.

But don't confuse simplicity with technological ignorance. The nuns live in the same century as the rest of us. They know all about carbon footprints and fossil-fuel costs. And here in this grass-choked field, on this hill where Sister Garrity stands, the nuns have plans, big 21st-century plans. "There are our sheep," she says, gesturing to the livestock in the pasture. "And right down here at the end of the fence is where we're going to put our turbine."

By turbine, Sister Garrity means wind turbine. And by "our," she means the nuns are going to own it. As they see it, the turbine will be a long-term investment, defraying roughly 75 percent of the abbey's electricity costs. Those are big savings that pretty much anyone can appreciate. And the nuns aren't the only ones chasing the wind.

While rich people with summer homes have spent the better part of the last decade fighting Cape Wind, a large offshore wind farm proposed for Nantucket Sound, single turbine projects, like the one going up at the abbey, are becoming increasingly common. In the last three years, the state has awarded $23 million to people looking to build one or two wind turbines on their property. There are now roughly 100 projects either scheduled to be built or being studied, according to the state. And with electricity costs in Massachusetts nearly three times higher than in 2000 -- and expected to keep rising -- it's no longer just green-minded liberals championing the cause of wind, but rather "radical freethinkers" like small-town officials, school superintendents, and businesspeople looking to save money while also doing a little something to help the earth.

Officials from Medford to Plymouth, Quincy to Sandwich have received state funding to study the feasibility of wind projects in their communities. High schools want them, and so do ski resorts. The idea, says James Christo, is becoming increasingly popular.

"It's still in the very early stage. They're very expensive, these projects," says Christo, the program director of green buildings and infrastructure at the Massachusetts Renewable Energy Trust, the state program that distributes grant funding to wind and other renewable energy projects. The turbines can cost more than a million dollars each. And they're often towering structures -- not to be confused with the small wind turbines that some Massachusetts residents have placed in their yards to help power their homes.

Still, Christo says, the demand is there. His telephone rings at least a couple of times every day with calls from people looking to build a turbine. Small wind development start-up companies, including one founded by a Tufts University junior, are springing up everywhere, and a new state law, signed by Governor Deval Patrick in July, makes community-sized wind projects more profitable than ever.

Under the new statute, owners of large turbines -- up to 2 megawatts (2,000 kilowatts), enough to power roughly 440 homes for an entire year -- can now sell excess power back to their electricity provider, like NStar or National Grid, something they could not do under old regulations. Or they can earn credits to cover other electricity costs -- say, at another nearby facility -- essentially spreading out their excess power as they see fit. So a turbine erected at a public high school on a hill could, in effect, help conserve power at town hall, too. Money saved in electricity costs over time could help save teachers' jobs or keep libraries open later. A wind turbine -- that dreaded eyesore to so many people on the Cape -- can give a strapped community options. As a result, a growing number of people are asking: Why not wind?

"The time for talking about this issue is over. We need action. We need hands-on learning," says Medford's mayor, Michael J. McGlynn, who hopes that a 100-kilowatt wind turbine scheduled to be erected at one of the city's public schools next month will help teach children the importance of conservation. "But, obviously, the money is significant, too. Any time you're saving $25,000 or $30,000 a year, you're saving somebody's job."

Such interest has created a land rush of sorts. The fact is, there are only so many places in the state where there's enough wind to make a turbine feasible. Many landlocked communities don't have enough wind on a daily basis to fly a kite, much less power a turbine, wind maps reveal. In Stow, about 30 miles west of Boston, officials studied wind power recently, only to realize that, sadly, they don't have much wind at all.

But experts like Nick D'Arbeloff, executive director of the New England Clean Energy Council, say there's no doubt where the market is headed. Forget about Cape Wind for a moment. Shelve the debate about that 130-turbine wind farm somewhere in Nantucket Sound. The future of wind power may be a lot smaller than you think, and the nearest windmill may be right around the corner. The landscape, many believe, is going to be dotted with them.

Before electricity and gasoline, nuclear power or coal, the peoples of Egypt, Phoenicia, and Persia set their minds on harnessing the wind. Powered by sails made of animal skins or woven reeds, and later flax and cotton, explorers traveled the world. And before the dawn of the second century, people realized that using sails on land -- in the form of a windmill -- could help move water or grind grain. The windmill became indispensable. From Crete to China to Europe and finally to the New World, farmers came to rely on these rudimentary turbines. They proliferated -- in particular across the American West, where the land was flat and the winds strong -- until, in 1888, a mustachioed Ohio inventor named Charles Brush set out to build a large windmill capable of generating electricity.

The machine, made in part of cedar, was hailed as a success, charging battery cells in Brush's basement, which in turn powered the newly invented light bulbs in his expansive Cleveland home. Over the course of the next century, countless engineers improved upon Brush's design, eventually replacing his 50-foot cedar slats with fiberglass blades often well over 100 feet long. California, in particular, became home to thousands of wind turbines, including, in 1981, the largest wind farm in the world: Altamont Pass. Developers, looking to reap the benefits before state and federal tax credits expired, rushed to build some 5,000 turbines in Altamont, an hour's drive east of San Francisco. The project was considered a noble effort to stave off future energy crises. There was just one problem: the birds.

"The big fatal flaw was nobody did an avian study before the project went into the ground," says Lisa Daniels, a Pittsfield native and Bentley College graduate who's now executive director of Windustry, a national nonprofit wind advocacy group based in Minneapolis. "Turns out, it's a raptor breeding area."

Birds, including golden eagles and red-tailed hawks, began dying off in droves every year, cut down by the whirling blades. Once a symbol for progress, Altamont quickly became the wind industry's albatross, a reason not to build turbines. Anyone opposed to a wind project, including those opposed to Cape Wind, could reference Altamont. And they did.

But much has changed since Altamont's folly. Bird studies are now standard operating procedure. Wind developers who cannot show what effect their turbines will have on the local wildlife population might as well fold up their blades and move on. And the technology itself has changed. Today's wind turbines -- which have a life span of about 20 years -- spin far more slowly than they did in the past, thus decreasing the risk of midair wildlife collisions. Still, the protests on the Cape, and elsewhere, continue as opponents complain about everything from a wind project's potential impact on wildlife, to noise, to the simple fact that one might have to look at the turbines in question. The problem can often be summed up in four simple words: Not in my backyard. "NIMBY," explains Ian Bowles, secretary of the state Department of Energy and Environmental Affairs. "That's the challenge. That's it."

But to wind developers like 30-year-old Kevin Schulte, the NIMBY argument simply isn't good enough anymore. Americans, Schulte says, have spent decades living in a world of "invisible energy." "We don't know," he says, "nor do we care, where we get our energy from, as long as the lights turn on when we flip the switch." But with increasing concerns about protecting the environment and meeting the energy needs of a fast-growing world, that has to change, Schulte believes. The brief, luxurious era of invisible energy may be coming to an end.

"Wind power is part of that," Schulte says. "It seems to be peppered all over society right now: green, green, green. Well, this is green. This is clean energy. This is 20 years of energy with no emissions. Twenty years of energy with no pollution you have to bury in the ground. I think that's all right."

S

chulte is baby-faced, bespectacled, and a bit wide in the waist. He's prone to wearing khaki pants and work boots, and he's not big on formalities. His uniform most days is a green T-shirt, untucked, emblazoned with his company's logo. The employees at Sustainable Energy Developments Inc. -- a wind development company that Schulte cofounded in 2002 -- call him Kev. And SED's Massachusetts office is not some stuffy, cubicle-walled fortress. It is a one-bedroom apartment, located above a chiropractor's office in Sterling, about 20 miles north of Worcester, where employees sometimes jockey for a place to sleep. "The couch is arguably most comfortable," says senior project manager Dave Strong, 29, sitting in the apartment one recent morning with an iced coffee in hand. "Real nice."

SED, based in upstate New York, opened the Sterling office -- couch and all -- about a year ago out of necessity. The wind business in Massachusetts was simply becoming too busy not to have a local office. The trips back and forth to New York every day were taking a toll on Schulte and the company's 16 other employees. They needed a place to crash, if nothing else. And the apartment, with its burnt-red walls, would do just fine. SED, like many wind-power start-ups, has humble roots.

It began in a different apartment outside of Albany six years ago, the brainchild of four classmates from James Madison University in Virginia and another friend. The idea, Schulte says, was to take what they learned working on wind farms and go smaller. Instead of building 100 turbines, build one. And instead of owning a wind farm -- as many developers do, selling the power for a profit -- SED's goal was managing the construction of a single turbine for a business or town, allowing the client to own the turbine and reap the benefits of the power it produced.

"It really is the model that is successful in Massachusetts right now," Schulte says. "I'm a believer in large wind. My background is large wind. But in Massachusetts, in the Northeast, where the population is dense, like Europe, you have to look to smaller projects. That's what's going to be successful."

This pitch is working for SED and other wind-power developers because, with electricity prices soaring, people are finally ready to hear it. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority -- the Commonwealth's largest user of electricity -- hired Schulte's crew this year with the hopes of building at least a couple of wind turbines. With the help of money from the state's Renewable Energy Trust, the T would like to build the first, a 100-kilowatt machine, at the end of the Old Colony commuter rail line in Kingston next spring.

T officials believe it could cover 75 percent of the station's power needs, and townspeople in Hanover, just a dozen miles from Kingston, have similar dreams. They voted in May to build a 100-kilowatt wind turbine to help power the town's water treatment plant, and if this turbine is successful, there are hopes of building two more in town.

There's also Jim Egan, the chairman of the Bank of Canton. He isn't exactly the portrait of the go-green movement. He's a 64-year-old lifelong banker who drives a Cadillac that gets 22 miles to the gallon. But with the help of state funding, Egan is also leading an effort to build a wind turbine -- this one at the company's headquarters on Route 138 in Canton. The reason, Egan says, is simple. The wind blows -- often hard -- at the bank's headquarters. And Egan, being a math guy, has run the numbers. With a wind turbine in place, the bank could save as much as $8,000 a month in energy costs. "We have this huge parking lot," he says. "It's just sitting there. And we could put this thing up. It wouldn't hurt a soul."

In fact, Egan points out, it would help people -- maybe even help business. A bank manages money for its customers, he says, and wouldn't customers want to know that the people in charge were thinking broadly? Actually doing something right from both a financial and environmental standpoint? In this way, wind turbines are actually becoming a sort of 21st-century marketing tool, even an attraction.

Take Forbes Park, for example. The 68-unit Chelsea project opening early next year is touted as a "sustainable condo development," complete with a small fleet of electric cars to be used by its residents and a 243-foot-tall wind turbine capable of powering almost 150 homes. In another neighborhood, such a structure might not be welcome. But developer Blair Galinsky is actually turning the NIMBY argument on its head. On this patch of land, overlooking the Mystic River, people actually want a wind turbine in their backyard, Galinsky says. And he is prepared to make the most of it. He is building a platform so that people can visit the turbine, and he plans to light it up at night for everyone to see.

"I can't honestly tell you how many people I've seen standing there, waiting there, looking at the windmill," Galinsky says. "They want to know more about it."

Here's how they work: The turbines tie right into the electrical grid and also into the structure to be powered. With a steady breeze blowing -- ideally, it averages about 13 miles per hour over the course of a year -- the large white fiberglass blades begin to rotate, which in turn spin a shaft inside the turbine. The spinning shaft powers a generator, and -- bingo -- you've got electricity.

But since the turbine is also connected to the grid, there's a little give and take. On calm, windless days, your school or water plant or bank simply draws electricity from the utility grid, as usual. And on windy days, you don't just feel good about saving money -- and the environment -- you're effectively getting paid. All excess electricity gets sucked up by the utility and -- thanks to the new legislation signed by Patrick -- you could be making 15 cents or more per kilowatt-hour generated. As the folks at Jiminy Peak Mountain Resort in the Berkshires can attest, those kilowatt-hours can add up.

Their turbine -- a 38-story, 1.5-megawatt windmill that's visible both in Massachusetts and across the state line in New York -- went up in August 2007 for about $4 million. Not cheap, even when you consider that the state kicked in $600,000 of that. But with the wind turbine capable of generating about 4 million kilowatt-hours annually -- enough to power more than 530 homes for an entire year -- the resort has options. It's saving about $400,000 a year in electricity costs. And under the new state statute, officials there expect to make another $250,000 selling energy back to the grid. Translation: The turbine will be paid off in about seven years.

"It's a fun machine," says 61-year-old Paul Maloney, the resort's vice president of operations, standing one recent afternoon beneath the towering, spinning turbine. He then stops and holds a finger in the air. And that's when you hear it.

Whoosh.

Whoosh.

Whoosh.

The sound is steady, rhythmic. And it's true: You can hear it at a distance, too, some days all the way down at the base of the mountain. Some days, farther. It depends on how the wind is blowing, locals say. But there have been few complaints. That's the thing about these single-turbine projects, says Warren Leon, former director of the Massachusetts Technology Collaborative, which administers the state's Renewable Energy Trust. There is a lot less opposition to them. And that, Leon says, is just one more reason why he expects to see wind turbines decorating the Massachusetts sky in the years ahead.

"I think we need to move aggressively and fast, but carefully and cautiously. That sounds contradictory," Leon says. "But I take the long view. We need to develop a lot more wind projects here in Massachusetts. But it won't be good in the long run if the first projects that get built don't perform well, engender a lot of opposition, and end up being perceived by the public as a bad idea. What I want to make sure is that 10 or 15 years from now, we have a large number of wind turbines spinning in Massachusetts and the public is happy about that."

Massachusetts-based wind developers are betting big that it will happen. Out of the success of the Jiminy Peak project, the resort's owners became so sure that wind is the way of the future that they founded Eos, a renewable-energy company of their own. "I'm convinced of it," says Tyler Fairbank, the son of Jiminy Peak co-owner Brian Fairbank and the CEO of Eos. "I'm obviously betting my career on it." So are Bob Shatten and Tom Michelman, the founders of Acton-based Boreal Renewable Energy Development. They not only oversaw the construction of the wind turbine at Galinsky's lofts in Chelsea, but they also have about a dozen Massachusetts projects in the pipeline. And then there's Greg Hering, the founder of Emergent Energy Group, another wind development company. He's just 21 years old, but not lacking at all for confidence. When asked how much money he -- a Tufts college kid -- can raise for the half-dozen utility-scale wind turbines he's looking to build across the state, Hering, who grew up in Natick, has his answer ready. "As much as I need," he says.

In fact, wind-power experts say, there are only a few factors holding back development. One is the resource itself. A quick look at the Massachusetts wind maps -- yes, there are wind maps -- reveals that many parts of the state just aren't that windy. And then there is the problem of getting equipment. Some developers say it can take a year, or longer, to get a turbine in hand. Still, though, they are building.

"These are the blades," Schulte of SED says, standing next to three 75-foot, soon-to-be-spinning rotors one late summer afternoon at Holy Name Central Catholic Junior-Senior High School in Worcester. "We've had a night watchman here at night," he adds, nodding to the rotors laid flat on bales of hay. "We can't have any vandals."

The 675-student school is cobbling together more than $1.5 million for its wind turbine, which Mary Riordan, the school's white-haired 70-year-old president, hopes to have paid off well within a decade. It's a lot of money, she confesses, and it's a hard time to be asking for donations. But she's doing it anyway -- and calling in some favors with the Catholic Church. In August, before Holy Name's turbine went up, Riordan had a local bishop come out and bless the turbine. And she's not the only one praying for a nice stiff breeze.

Remember the nuns? Their turbine -- another SED project -- is scheduled to be built this winter. And Sister Mariann Garrity, for one, can't wait for the moment she sees those pearly white blades spinning. "The wind is just something that we've let caress our faces," she says. "It was not something, up until now, that we had learned how to harness. And when we see that turbine go up, we'll know that we are using a gift of creation in a much more effective way."

It's just like the nuns pray on Sundays. Gathered together, all 50 of them, they thank the Lord for the rain and the dew, for the heat of summer and the cold of winter. They give thanks for the seas and the rivers and the beasts, wild and tame. And they give thanks, of course, for the wind blowing outside the abbey, just waiting for a turbine to spin. "All you winds," they say together, quoting from the book of Daniel, "bless the Lord."

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/magazine/articles/2008/11/30/higher_power/?page=full