Energy Exchange

Dallas Fort-Worth Breathes Easier Following EPA’s Decision On Wise County Ozone Petitions

By EDF Blogs / Published: January 16, 2013

This commentary was originally posted on EDF’s Texas Clean Air Matters blog.

Just in time for the holidays, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) delivered a valuable gift to residents of the Dallas-Fort Worth area: the promise of stronger protections against the harmful public health and environmental impacts of ground-level ozone (the main component of smog). Specifically, EPA announced on January 7 that it has decided to deny 19 petitions filed by the state of Texas and other parties last summer — all demanding that the agency reverse its determination that Wise County, Texas contributes to high ozone levels in nearby Dallas-Fort Worth (EPA’s responses were signed December 14, 2012). EPA’s action means that polluters in Wise County will have to do their fair share to reduce ozone levels in Dallas-Fort Worth, which have been among the worst in the country for many years. Because of the importance of this issue to the public health of Texans, EDF has already taken steps to defend EPA’s action in Federal court.

Background

Ozone pollution has long been regulated under the Clean Air Act because of the tremendous hazards that ozone poses to public health and the environment. High ozone levels lead to respiratory distress and disorders; decreased lung function; increases in emergency room visits and sick days; and more. To address the serious problem of ozone, the Clean Air Act provides a multi-step process for ensuring that all areas of the country achieve acceptable ozone levels. First, EPA must establish nationwide air quality standards for ozone (called National Ambient Air Quality Standards), which are required to be strong enough to protect public health with an adequate margin of safety. Second, EPA must designate which areas of the country meet those standards, and which do not. Lastly, states are required to submit plans for achieving and maintaining compliance with EPA’s ozone standards — with especially strict requirements for areas that currently do not meet the standards.

EPA last updated its ozone air quality standards in March 2008. The revised standard requires that average ozone concentrations over an 8-hour period remain at or below 75 parts per billion (ppb) — a level that is more protective than the previous standard set in 1997, but still significantly higher than the range of 60 to 70 ppb recommended by EPA’s own Scientific Advisory Committee. EDF has consistently advocated for a stronger ozone standard, and has even taken EPA to court over this issue together with other public health and environmental organizations. At the same time, EDF has also fought hard against attempts to weaken the 2008 ozone standards or stop their implementation.

Designation of Wise County

On May 21, 2012, EPA issued a regulation designating 45 areas of the country as out of compliance with the 2008 ozone standards – including a group of ten counties in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, which had long failed to meet the earlier and less stringent ozone standards. For the first time, however, the Dallas-Fort Worth designation also included Wise County, Texas, due in large part to emissions of nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds from a recent boom in oil and gas production in the area.

As EPA explained in a detailed technical analysis, Wise County was included in the Dallas-Fort Worth ozone designation because of the county’s contribution to unhealthy levels of ozone. Among other things, EPA found that ozone monitors less than half a mile from the county line were recording unhealthy levels of ozone; that Wise County emits some of the highest levels of ozone-forming pollution in the 19-county area surrounding Dallas-Fort Worth; and that the prevailing winds on high-ozone days are responsible for bringing that pollution from Wise County to the nearby city.

Ensuing Litigation and Requests for Reconsideration

EPA’s determination was reached after a lengthy process during which the state of Texas and other stakeholders had ample opportunity to submit comments and data on Wise County’s contribution to ozone in Dallas-Fort Worth. However, this didn’t stop the state, some local governments, and various oil and gas producers and trade associations from trying to stop the designation of Wise County by filing a total of 19 petitions asking EPA to reverse its decision. The state of Texas, Wise County, and four industry parties also filed legal challenges to EPA’s determination in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals — and EDF responded by moving to intervene in defense of EPA’s action.

EPA’s Denial of Reconsideration and Next Steps

In detailed responses to the petitions, EPA reaffirmed its analysis of Wise County’s contribution to the local ozone crisis and offered rebuttals to each of the major arguments advanced by the petitioners. EPA’s responses confirm that the designation of Wise County rests on the best available science. EPA’s action is also an important advance for public health — ensuring that polluters in Wise County will do their fair share to address ozone pollution in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, and that the important protections of the Clean Air Act extend to ozone-contributing areas and sources that have been overlooked in the past.

We hope that the parties challenging the Wise County designation will ultimately decide to demonstrate leadership by becoming part of the solution to the air quality challenges facing Dallas-Fort Worth. In the meantime, vital work remains to be done to defend EPA’s actions in court: the ongoing D.C. Circuit challenges to the original designation of Wise County, which were suspended while EPA processed the reconsideration petitions, are likely to resume in a matter of weeks. In addition, EPA’s decisions on the petitions may provide fresh fodder for additional legal challenges in the D.C. Circuit. EDF’s legal team stands ready to vigorously defend EPA’s decision in the months ahead.

Posted in Natural Gas, Texas / Comments are closed

EDF’s Investor Confidence Project Helps Achieve The Potential Of Energy Efficiency

By EDF Blogs / Published: January 15, 2013

This blog post was written by guest blogger Matt Golden, Senior Energy Finance Consultant.

The EDF Investor Confidence Project (ICP) has been a two-year process to help standardize the commercial energy efficiency industry. Working with a wide range of project advisors, the first set of protocols designed for large commercial building projects are now available for a public beta on our website www.EEperformance.org. The goal is to simplify the process of creating an investment-quality energy efficiency project, reducing engineering-related transaction costs and increasing deal flow and savings.

We believe that the Investor Confidence Project represents a “silver buckshot” that, when combined with other efforts underway such as On-bill repayment (OBR), Commercial PACE and benchmarking programs, can help deliver a sustainable, private capital-driven market. This will help spur economic development in these challenging times and achieve the potential of energy efficiency as a clean and cost-effective climate and energy policy.

While there are many technical standards regarding how to engineer various aspects of a project, we currently lack a meta layer that creates standardization at the project level. Ultimately, a project’s performance is only as good as the sum of its parts. The ICP protocols are combinations of the existing technical standards in the market, offering clear definitions for how a project is engineered, documented and ultimately measured. In the short-run, this can greatly accelerate channels and increase volume, and, over the long-term, can lead to increased access to lower-cost capital.

The Investor Confidence Project is happy to announce (and thank) our new ICP Allies, who have committed to piloting the ICP protocols in 2013. SciEnergy, Energi, Sustainable Real Estate Solutions, Bright Power, The Association for Energy Affordability, kWhOURS, Inc., Performance Systems Development, Clean Energy Finance and Investment Authority, Rocky Mountain Institute, Institute for Market Transformation, The Centre for Building Performance and the Building Energy Retrofit Institute are moving towards adopting the ICP Energy Efficiency Performance Protocol for Large Commercial Projects as their preferred method for estimating, measuring and reporting savings for large commercial projects.

We have been experiencing a ground swell of support coming from both public programs and market players, who have been instrumental in helping us identify this critical need and develop a set of protocols that balance engineering best practices with market-based realities. While ICP initially focused on financial investors as the key customers, we are now seeing a wide variety of users, including utilities, public programs, insurers and energy service companies, in addition to equity and debt investors and of course building owners.

As we roll-out this initiative in 2013 and achieve critical mass, our focus is now on gaining real-world feedback. We are also embarking on developing two additional protocols tailored to multi-family building retrofits and smaller commercial projects. If you are interested in learning more, or getting involved, please let us know by visiting the ICP website for more details about the project and our Large Commercial protocol.

America’s Military Renewables Plan Fast-Tracked And Mission Critical

By EDF Blogs / Published: August 23, 2012

By: Jillian Jordan, EDF Energy Marketing & Communications Intern

This months’ announcement from the White House calling for green energy bids and its plan to fast-track wind and solar projects delivered a clear message that renewable energy is something the American military – and its government – whole-heartily believes in. The federal government’s Renewable Energy Partnership Plan (Plan), headed by the Department of Defense (DoD) and the Department of the Interior (DOI), is pushing new project development on and near numerous military installations to the tune of $7 billion dollars.

Even more compelling is the fact that clean energy is now considered part of America’s national security plan by key political figures and the DoD. The White House’s Heather Zichal, Deputy Assistant for Energy and Climate Change, has commended this strategic move towards clean energy and endorsed the Plan as “operationally necessary, financially prudent and mission critical.”

So mission critical, in fact, that the Army has planned the incorporation of renewables as a high-priority tactic for saving lives. Military convoys have long been known to be one of the most dangerous operations, costing more lives than many other career fields in the armed forces. When supplies like gasoline run out, transportation troops are assigned the duty of delivering them through hostile territory. For every 24 fuel resupply missions, one American life is lost – which constitutes one out of every eight deaths in Iraq. Using clean energy actually saves lives for today’s military. The less fossil fuel used and the less dependent we are on oil, the less convoy trips are needed for refueling and to run diesel generators that power military tents, therefore minimizing the risk for American troops.

The alternative energy infrastructure projects under the Plan will create jobs favoring local economies, produce about 7,200 megawatts of energy and utilize millions of acres of public lands and offshore areas that are best suited for wind and solar projects, all while meeting the goals of the federal Energy Policy Act of 2005. Under the Act, the military has voluntary plans for 25% of its energy produced by clean sources by 2025.

“Developing renewable energy is the right thing to do for national security, as well as for the environment and our economy,” Secretary of Defense Leon E. Panetta said. “Renewable energy projects built on these lands will provide reliable, local sources of power for military installations; allow for a continued energy supply if the commercial power grid gets disrupted; and will help lower utility costs.”

In addition to becoming independent from the national grid, utility costs have been upwards of $4 billion annually and the task force assigned to the Plan is determined to lower the DoD’s energy bill and curtail energy usage. But, above all, the goal is to maintain the military’s ability to remain powered during mission-critical times. Conditions of the Plan offer an added safety net in the event of a massive blackout or, for a worst-case-scenario attack on America’s power grid.

Preliminary site evaluation began with DOI’s Smart from the Start initiative under Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar. Pilot projects are currently underway in Arizona, California, Nevada and Wyoming, with more fast-tracked proposals to be announced in the next few weeks. The Renewable Energy Partnership Plan signed between the two agencies would allow the military to purchase power produced from homegrown, renewable energy sources, which could lead to a reduction in clean energy costs and an overall boost to the alternative energy sector.

Of the DOI’s 28 million acres, 16 million of which were designated for defense, 13 million that are rich in resources and ideal for wind, solar and geothermal power generation. “Our nation’s military lands hold great renewable energy potential, and this partnership will help ensure that we’re tapping into these resources with a smart and focused approach to power our military, reduce energy costs, and grow our nation’s energy independence,” Salazar said.

Posted in Renewable Energy, Washington, DC / Read 5 Responses

Future Energy – Needed Now

By EDF Blogs / Published: August 8, 2012

By: Richie Ahuja, Regional Director, Asia, and Andy Darrell, New York Regional Director and Deputy Director of the Energy Program

Credit: Parivartan Sharma / Reuters

“Leopards and elephants often wander in…”says the manager of a tea plantation in India, left in the dark without electricity after the near total collapse of India’s electric grid. Trains stopped, miners were stuck underground, traffic lights went out, and homes and businesses were left without electricity. It was the world’s largest blackout, affecting more than 600 million people.

The truth is, the electric grid in many parts of the world is fragile, often struggling to match supply and demand. The United States is no stranger to blackouts either, as the Washington post reports. “My house lost power for four days,” notes a fellow EDF’er living in Washington, DC in regards to an outage earlier this July.

Yet technology is available to make grids much more resilient, nimble — and climate friendly. From sensors that identify weak spots in advance, to ways to store wind power in electric cars overnight, and buildings that make money by selling “negawatts” into the grid at peak times, we know how to get this right.

Globally, trillions of dollars are poised to be invested into electricity systems in developed and developing countries. Surprisingly, a lot of the medicine to cure the grid is remarkably similar across the world – deploy sensors that gather data that can be used for both reliability and pollution reduction, make it easy to plug renewables into the network, and reward efficiency and demand response. Build a data-driven, flexible network that uses technology to harness the power of information.

What’s holding us back is not technology or the will to innovate: it is outdated regulation and policy. Like most markets, the electricity market is governed by many rules – rules that frame what’s welcome to enter the market, access to data, how much any of us can make by putting solar panels on our house, etc. With so much investment about to happen, isn’t it time we took a hard look at those rules, to make sure we end up with a network that welcomes the future and rewards reliable, clean energy?

Austin’s Pecan Street project is pioneering a new way of doing business, one that works for families, for businesses, for people – and the planet. EDF is taking what we learned from that project and developing ideas for how to open much larger markets to innovation, like California and parts of the Midwest.

Leopards and elephants seem a long way away from our homes here in the U.S.… but reading about this crisis in India makes us realize how related the solutions to our energy futures really are. And how important it is, in each country, to get it right.

Posted in Grid Modernization / Comments are closed

When Utilities Embrace The Smart Grid, Customers And The Environment Win

By EDF Blogs / Published: May 31, 2012

By: Scott Robinson, EDF Energy Intern and Energy & Earth Resources Fellow at The University of Texas at Austin, Jackson School of Geosciences

Source: Greentech Media

Earlier this month, Greentech Media released their “Top Ten Utility Smart Grid Deployments in North America.” These are utilities that deserve recognition—while most experts agree that bringing the transformative power of information technology to the grid is critical to achieving a clean, low-carbon economy, being an early adopter means carrying a certain amount of risk. A utility’s willingness to take on this risk demonstrates a long-term commitment to its customers. EDF is championing well-designed smart grids as the path to abundant, cheaper and cleaner energy. Because utilities will be responsible for building and operating this new “energy internet,” our push for smart grid innovation has led to productive partnerships with several of Greentech Media’s top ten.

In Austin, Texas, we are working with Austin Energy and the University of Texas, among others, to develop the Pecan Street smart grid demonstration project in the Mueller community: a real neighborhood and living laboratory that will allow researchers to better understand what smart grid will look like on the ground, as well as how individual technologies—from smart appliances to residential solar PV to electric vehicles—will interact to enable greater reliance on renewable and community-based resources. For consumers, this means real-time insight into how they’re using energy and its true cost: understanding its source and emissions to help them make decisions that save money and shrink their environmental footprint.

In Charlotte, North Carolina, EDF is working with Duke Energy and others on the Envision Charlotte project to increase energy management in big downtown buildings, improve local air quality and reduce water consumption and waste in a concentrated urban area. We are helping to implement the use of smart grid technologies with the ultimate goal of reducing energy consumption by 20 percent in 60 high-rises over five years: through better information for building occupants about their energy use and tools enabling them to act on that insight. Also, during the summer of 2011, two EDF Climate Corps fellows reviewed three buildings in Mecklenburg County (where Charlotte is located) and found energy efficiency measures that could save the county more than $500,000 in just five years.

In California, EDF has worked on multiple cutting-edge projects, including working directly with San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) – the nation’s most intelligent utility – and developing a “scorecard ” to evaluate the Smart Grid Deployment Plans of California’s three largest investor-owned utilities’ – SDG&E, Pacific Gas & Electric (PG&E) and Southern California Edison (SCE) for their overall direction in meeting environmental and savings goals. We will continue to drive the benefits from the smart grid for Californian’s utility bills, health and environment.

To maximize environmental returns on these multi-billion dollar investments in grid modernization, it is critical that utilities develop holistic plans and build open platforms that give customers access to new energy saving technologies and “apps” and enable scale integration of renewables and electric vehicles. Done right, the smart grid will drive the clean energy revolution we need—helping utilities reliably deliver power, securing our energy independence, increasing our ability to compete in the global clean energy market, growing our economy and empowering consumers—all while protecting our air, water, and health. EDF is committed to finding ways that allow utilities and consumers to reap the benefits of their investment in the future.

Our partnerships with utilities have led to a greater understanding of the smart grid as an emerging solution to today’s environmental and electricity problems. We look forward to continuing our work with these energy pioneers and expanding our partnerships to help other utilities get their projects off the ground.

Posted in Grid Modernization / Read 2 Responses

EDF Climate Corps Blog Posts Have Moved

By EDF Blogs / Published: May 24, 2012

For those of you who’ve scoured EDF’s blogs for news from EDF Climate Corps, life is about to get much easier. From here on out, you’ll find all posts and updates from EDF Climate Corps fellows, host organizations and staff on the EDF Climate Corps blog, which launched Tuesday.

For those of you unfamiliar with EDF Climate Corps, it’s EDF’s innovative fellowship program that places specially trained MBA and MPA students in companies, cities and universities to build the business case for energy efficiency. This year’s class of 98 fellows starts this week with an intensive energy efficiency training underway in Charlotte, NC before they’re set loose to sleuth out energy savings at 88 leading companies, cities and universities across the nation.

Visit us here for news from the frontlines of energy efficiency. This summer we’ll also feature several ongoing series, such as a weekly report on themes in organizational change we see bubbling up from the collective experience of our fellows.

If you want to stay in the loop, don’t forget to sign up for email alerts in the left-hand menu. If you’re signed up for EDF Climate Corps alerts from the EDF Business Blog or the EDF Energy Exchange, you should sign up again at our new location to continue receiving them.

Posted in EDF Climate Corps / Comments are closed