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Energy Crunch: Saving Energy In Texas Schools Is A Win-Win

By Kate Zerrenner / Published: January 17, 2013

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

The Texas Legislature is back in session, and there will be, as always, a lot of discussion about how to fund schools. The school system in our state seems to be chronically short of funds to meet the demands of our growing state and its children.

But while the state-level politicians discuss, some school districts are taking matters into their own hands where they can. In the summer 2012, the Houston Independent School District (HISD), the seventh largest school district in the U.S. and the state’s largest, hosted a student through the EDF Climate Corps program. The program trains graduate students to find energy savings in their host institutions or companies. The Climate Corps fellow at HISD found several potential projects to help save the district money. For example, HISD has approximately 1,000 temporary buildings. The fellow found that if all the trailer-type temporary buildings’ lighting and wall air conditioning units and box heaters were upgraded and had insulation installed, at an upfront cost of $453,000, the district would realize over $62,000 in annual savings, nearly 700 kilowatt hours in annual electricity savings, and an annual reduction of approximately 400 metric tons of carbon dioxide. And that’s just one project!

The student’s work built on the findings of an audit funded through the State Energy Conservation Office (SECO) in 2007, which estimated that with recommended upgrades, HISD could cut its annual energy costs by $15 million!

Since the 2007 audit was performed, Houston voters have approved two bonds to help upgrade their school district, including one in November 2012. In the last bond vote, they approved, by a margin of nearly 2:1, a $1.89 billion bond to replace and repair 40 schools in HISD. In recent years, HISD has committed to ensuring all new and future buildings meet Leadership in Energy and Environment Design (LEED) standards for green building.

In 2009, the Texas Legislature passed Senate Bill 300, which was signed by Governor Perry. It requires school districts to develop long-term energy plans. It leaves it up to the boards of trustees of the individual school districts to determine if they want to submit the plan to SECO to help finance measures for plan compliance. There is no way to determine which school districts have developed plans or are implementing them. This Legislature could require school districts to report to SECO or could establish some minimum standards for building new school facilities or renovating existing ones.

Nationwide, schools spend more than $6 billion on energy costs, and the US Department of Energy National Renewable Energy Lab estimates that most schools could save about 25 percent of that by implementing smart energy measures. Those savings could pay 40 million new textbooks, 30,000 new teachers or 1.5 million new computers every year.

Some relatively simple measures such as daylighting (using windows and skylights to bring in natural light) have a double benefit—in addition to saving the average middle school tens of thousands of dollars in energy costs, daylighting technologies are also proven to improve students’ academic performance. One study in North Carolina showed that students who attended daylight schools scored up to 14 percent better on tests than the equivalent non- daylight school students. Smarter energy technologies and conservation measures lead to lower electricity costs, but also to lower maintenance costs, better indoor air quality, and free up money that can be used on other necessities, such as hiring teachers or buying more computers.

There is often an upfront cost to installing these energy efficiency technologies (although many conservation measures, such as turning off vending machine lights require no cost and only save money), but in most cases, school districts are in a good position to take advantage of several financing options. SECO operates the LoanSTAR program, which uses a revolving loan mechanism to fund energy efficiency projects for public buildings, including those in school districts. SECO also operates the Texas Cool Schools grant program, which helps Texas schools lower their operating costs by purchasing new and more energy-efficient heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) systems.

Performance contracting is another way to finance upfront costs for schools. Under performance contracts, contractors pay the upfront costs, which are recouped through a portion of the resulting savings, and even guarantee net savings for the building owner.

As we start this new Legislative Session in Texas, and parallel debates happen about our impending energy crunch and how to fund schools, doesn’t it make sense to merge these two issues? Help our school districts reduce energy costs (and in the process improve indoor air quality, student performance, and water efficiency) and enable them to spend their money on improving education, and reduce stress on the grid. Don’t the schoolchildren of Texas deserve that?

Also posted in Energy Efficiency / Comments are closed

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.

Also posted in Natural Gas / Comments are closed

NERC Demands Action From ERCOT To Keep The Lights On In Texas

By / Published: January 14, 2013

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

Last week was a busy one in Texas, with the beginning of the 83rd Legislative session attention was focused on incoming lawmakers, both seasoned and freshmen, and the opportunity that only happens every two years to address serious issues in Texas including water scarcity, education, tax issues, and of course energy issues.

So it’s understandable that no one seems to have noticed a strongly worded letter to the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) from the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) last Monday demanding more action to ensure electric reliability in Texas, and asking ERCOT to report back to NERC by April 30 on additional actions taken. NERC isn’t some federal boogey man either; it’s a corporation founded by the electric industry to create commonly accepted standards for electric reliability across North America, usually through voluntary compliance. President Bush’s Energy Policy Act of 2005 gave the corporation “the authority to create and enforce compliance with Reliability Standards,” which is where this letter comes into play.

In their 2012 report, NERC highlighted ERCOT as the only region in North America that was not maintaining adequate electric reserves to meet demand, and with this letter they made it very clear that the actions taken to date have not done enough to mitigate that risk. In the letter, NERC President Gerry Cauley notes that the PUC and ERCOT are continuing to address energy reliability issues, but finds that “solutions have not yet sufficiently materialized to address NERC’s reserve margin concern.”

Cauley goes on to say that “it is still unclear to us how ERCOT intends to mitigate issues that may arise on the current trajectory and when new resources may be available to meet growing demand.” So according to the corporation whose membership consists mostly of utilities, grid operators, large and small customers, and electric regulators, the actions that the PUC and ERCOT have taken at this point are not enough to ensure we’ll have reliable electric supply, risking blackouts as soon as this summer.

As lawmakers settle into Austin for the next few months they’ll certainly be paying close attention to this issue, though many have indicated they would prefer that ERCOT and the PUC develop the solutions to this problem. Cauley’s letter serves as notice that the PUC and ERCOT need to be more aggressive if they want to ensure a reliable supply of power in Texas. Certainly both agencies are putting serious time and effort into keeping the lights on in Texas, including effort so expand existing demand response programs, but NERC clearly thinks they need to be doing more.

All of this reminds me of the Texas drought: a year ago it was a huge looming crises, but a break in the weather took everyone’s mind off of the drying rivers and lakes, even though they never really recovered. Lately the drought has been back in the news as Texans realize that we’re basically in the same place that we were in 2011.

No one could accuse ERCOT or the PUC of sitting idly by or pretending this risk isn’t real. However, they have yet to send a strong enough signal to the market to spur investors in demand response or any other resources to develop new projects. About the only thing that has been done is the extension of the federal production tax credit for wind energy, which has wind developers racing to build new projects in Texas. The concern is that the solutions they’ve begun work on to date may not get us to where we need to be by this summer.

This letter is a reminder that the energy crunch hasn’t gone away, things are not likely to change in the near term if serious action isn’t taken soon. That is a risk we can’t afford to take given a looming drought, a growing economy and a stagnant electric market. NERC has asked ERCOT to report to them on their progress by April 30, near the end of our biennial legislative session, and one in which the critical PUC/ERCOT sunset legislation is expected to pass, maybe legislators should consider a similar request.

Also posted in Demand Response, Energy Efficiency / Tagged , | Comments are closed

Wind Update: The PTC And A Christmas Day Record

By Marita Mirzatuny / Published: January 9, 2013

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

Source: Houston Chronicle

Good news came out of the fiscal cliff ordeal last week when Congress voted to extend the Production Tax Credit (PTC) for renewables, which had expired on January 1. While the 2.2 cent-per-kilowatt-hour credit has only been extended through 2013, it provides some certainty to an industry that was holding its breath. As we’ve discussed previously, while the tax breaks for the oil and gas industry are written into the permanent tax code, the credits for wind and other renewables are not. Created under the Energy Policy Act of 1992, the PTC income tax credit is allowed for the production of electricity from utility-scale wind turbines, geothermal, solar, hydropower, biomass and marine and hydrokinetic renewable energy plants.

While this extension through the year does not appear to provide a great deal of long-term certainty, my colleague Colin Meehan points out that “an important distinction with this extension is that prior to 2013, the tax credits were awarded to facilities operational by the end of 2012. The extension now applies to facilities for which construction begins by the end of 2013. As a result, this is more like a two-year extension.” Cameron Fredkin, director of project development at Cross Texas, further emphasizes the point by highlighting that “the key provision in the extension is the requirement to begin construction in 2013 versus previous one-year extensions that required wind developers to complete construction and begin operations in 2013. Wind developers in the Panhandle region in the interconnection study process would have had difficulty achieving commercial operations in 2013.”

According to the American Wind Energy Association, “America’s 75,000 workers in wind energy are celebrating over the continuation of policies expected to save up to 37,000 jobs and create far more over time, and to revive business at nearly 500 manufacturing facilities across the country. Half the American jobs in wind energy – 37,000 out of 75,000 – and hundreds of U.S. factories in the supply chain would have been at stake had the PTC been allowed to expire, according to a study by Navigant Consulting.”

As I wrote back in November, many of those projects and jobs that were on the line while Congress delayed are here in Texas. In Amarillo, Walt Hornaday, president of Ceilo Wind Energy, said the tax credit helped “dust off projects [they] had put on the shelf.” Hornaday says he is “impressed wind was in the bill with big-ticket items like Medicaid and the Farm Bill. It used to be wind wouldn’t have a chance to be included. I thought we’d be left out in the cold.” According to The Hill, “The wind industry has floated a phase-out plan for the credit as a way to cement some stability and avoid annual battles to extend the credit. Securing the extension now sets the table for those discussions.”

Andy Geissbuehler, head of Alstom’s North American wind business, a manufacturer of wind turbine equipment, believes that “the extension of the Production Tax Credit for wind power is a positive development for our company, our customers, and the many workers across the country employed directly and indirectly by the wind power industry. As an equipment supplier, we stand ready to provide the equipment that can be manufactured in our Amarillo facility to project developers across North America. We remain optimistic about the long-term market for wind power market in North America, especially now that the U.S. Production Tax Credit has been extended another year.”

One possible casualty of Congress’ stalling is the $5 million, 80,000-square-foot facility left behind by Zarges Aluminum Systems. The German company planned to produce wind tower components, such as ladders and platforms. A spokesman at the time blamed the recession and uncertainty regarding the tax credits as well as low natural gas prices for putting pressure on its customers and the company itself.

This extension comes at a time when wind set a new record in 2012 by installing 44 percent of all new electrical generating capacity in America, according to the Energy Information Administration, leading the electric sector compared with 30 percent for natural gas, and lesser amounts for coal and other sources. Here in Texas, wind set another record, providing 8,638 megawatts (MW) of power on Christmas Day, with 6,600 MW coming from West Texas wind farms and 1,600 MW coming from the Texas coast. This adds up to nearly 26 percent of the system load, which is 117 MW higher than the previous record set in November 2012.

As Kent Saathoff, vice president of grid operations and system planning at the Electric Reliability Grid of Texas (ERCOT), points out, “Unlike traditional power plants, wind power output can vary dramatically over the course of a single day, and even more so over time. With new tools and experience, our operators have learned how to harness every megawatt of power they can when the wind is blowing at high levels like this.”

Those new tools and experience are exactly why the PTC is an important component of this emerging energy sector’s ability to grow and innovate, especially as ERCOT reviews an additional 20,000 MW of wind power capacity. This is in addition to the more than 10,000 MW it already has installed, which is the highest amount in the nation.

Also posted in Renewable Energy / Tagged | Read 2 Responses

A Red Flag On Disclosure Of Hydraulic Fracturing Chemicals

By Scott Anderson / Published: December 12, 2012

It’s not often that a new regulatory idea becomes so popular that one or more states per month climb on the bandwagon. But that is precisely what has happened with the push to disclose which chemicals are pumped into the ground to stimulate oil and natural gas production during the process known as hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.”

A year ago, only three states (Arkansas, Montana and Wyoming) required oil and gas producers to tell the public what chemicals they were using. Two other states (Colorado and Texas) were actively developing such rules. Today, just twelve months later, statutes or regulations mandating “frack” chemical disclosure are on the books in no fewer than 18 states, and proposals are pending or under consideration in several others.

FracFocus, an online registry that compiles information on hydraulic fracturing chemicals both for states where disclosure is voluntary and required, has been up and running for just 20 months, but already it houses approximately 800,000 records that include ingredients data. As of December 5, 2012, this data represented 33,606 wells. The amount of information on the site continues to grow rapidly.

It is impressive that so much information has been made available in such a short time. Still, people have begun to wonder whether the disclosure rules are accomplishing what was intended. The question is important because rules that aren’t working need to be changed. A good regulatory system is based on a process of continual improvement, not a naive idea that the rulebook can be written in a way that will never need changing.

Unfortunately, judging from early press reports, there are quite a few bugs in the system. To be fair, the reporting requirements are quite new and still being implemented — and analysis of the data has barely begun. But  problems are emerging. The issue receiving the most media attention is the sheer number of trade secret claims. Read More »

Also posted in General, Natural Gas / Read 5 Responses

Pecan Street Inc. Researchers’ Report Receives Outstanding Paper Award

By / Published: December 11, 2012

Source: Pecan Street Inc.

With 1.8 gigawatts (GW) of solar power installed in 2011 and an expected 2.8 GW in 2012, it is safe to say that solar energy has solidified its role as an important part of our nation’s energy portfolio. Affordability, competitive financing and reduced greenhouse gases are just a few of the reasons why the number of solar installations has skyrocketed in the past several years.

Now, new research from Dr. Alexis Kwasinski, Dr. Fabian Uriarte, and Amir Toliyat, engineers from the University of Texas at Austin, sheds some light on how rapidly growing solar installations can work with the current electric grid. For their groundbreaking findings in “Effects of high penetration levels of residential photovoltaic generation,” they were recently awarded an Outstanding Paper Award at the International Conference on Renewable Energy Research and Applications (ICRERA) in November for their in-depth research and innovative solutions.

Jump started by a $10.4 million grant from the Department of Energy, Pecan Street Inc. is a “community-wide collaboration to fully reinvent the energy delivery system”  based in Austin, Texas.  This living ‘smart grid laboratory’ provided a perfect data collection site for the researchers. Pecan Street’s leadership focuses on developing new technologies that reinvent the way we create and use energy, so that residents drive electric vehicles, invest in cutting-edge technology and, of course, use solar panels.

The massive amount of data gathered from Pecan Street’s efforts provided researchers the opportunity to analyze solar energy’s effect on the three key characteristics of “power quality” (voltage level, voltage unbalance and power factor).  The researchers found that energy inflections (voltage levels and voltage unbalance) did not create any major concerns with the power grid, despite unfounded claims to the contrary by some solar critics.

Digging further into the data, the researchers unexpectedly found that power factor could become a real issue if solar installers don’t use modern equipment that provides for power factor support.  While the issue could become very real at higher levels of solar penetration, the solution is simple, cheap and currently available; it simply means installers should begin using newer models of solar panel “inverters,” which convert solar power into electricity that can be fed into your grid and home.

Inverters simply convert raw DC power to AC power (i.e. the type of electricity we need to use everyday household items). Maximizing the amount of electricity that is converted into usable power makes solar energy more competitive, ensuring that it will remain an important and growing part of our nation’s energy mix.

It’s exciting to see that these researchers are receiving accolades for their groundbreaking work, and international acclaim is always an excellent motivator for this kind of work, but it’s nice to be appreciated where you hang your hat too.  Fortunately that doesn’t seem to be a problem, since earlier this year Austinites voted in the Best of Austin 2012 award by the Austin Chronicle for Best Way to Turn Some Green Even Greener.  Their choice: Pecan Street Inc.

Also posted in Grid Modernization / Tagged | Read 1 Response