SustainAbility: Clean Energy Collective
By Adele Israel
Monday, June 28, 2010
I first heard about the Clean Energy Collective last month at the 2010 Alliance for Sustainable Colorado Regional Sustainability Roundtable in Rifle.
It sounded intriguing, so I did a little research.
The collective provides a way to decrease your carbon footprint, combat climate change and save money on electricity, all in one fell swoop.
For residents of Roaring Fork and Vail valleys, the collective is an offer too good to refuse.
According to its website, the Carbondale-based collective is a “member-owned cooperative venture that builds and operates centralized clean power-generation facilities at the community level.”
Founded by Roaring Fork native Paul Spencer, the energy collective has been compared to community gardens, only instead of growing food locally, they are generating electricity locally.
The collective has three goals:
1. Accelerate the adoption of long-term clean energy solutions (make them easier, cheaper, safer and longer lasting)
2. Provide utilities with lower risk, well-located and more beneficial clean energy generation (smart clean energy growth).
3. Create a manageable and mutually beneficial production partnership between utilities and consumers.
To get involved in this first of its kind effort, you must invest a minimum of $500, but you can lower utility costs and make a move to electricity generated by renewable sources.
These sources include solar, wind, geothermal, biomass and micro-hydro systems.
In cooperation with local utilities, the collective builds and maintains medium-scaled clean energy facilities that are owned by you and your neighbors.
The collective is able to take advantage of the plethora of rebates, tax incentives and monthly power credits to keep costs low and members receive credits on their monthly electric bills.
A lifetime warranty comes with membership.
The collective works in conjunction with RemoteMeter, which “fully integrates with utility billing systems through a versatile integration engine,” according to the collective’s website. “It tracks and applies clean energy production credits directly on customer bills depending on the utility’s policies, manages production surpluses and integrates with facility meters and meteorological data for real time production monitoring.”
The collective has been busy installing a large solar array in El Jebel and has plans for installations in Snowmass and Garfield and Eagle counties. A proposed array at the Eagle County landfill near Dotsero covers 7 acres with 8,000 panels and will be one of the largest arrays in Colorado.
A May 2010 Solar Daily article quoted Steve Casey of Holy Cross Energy, which provides power to most Roaring Fork Valley consumers. “The CEC model provides a unique vehicle for our members to participate and enjoy the benefits of renewable energy generation,” Casey said.
No projects for Mesa County are on the collective’s drawing board, but our area is on its radar.
Spencer told me the Grand Valley is a “fantastic match with solar” and he wants to sit down with representatives from Grand Valley Power later this summer.
In Aspen Times article earlier this month, Spencer stated, “one of my goals is to eliminate every barrier to green energy.”
Once the collective gets up and running in this area then we can “Join the Clean Energy Collective — member owned, nature operated.”
Learn more at http://www.clean energycollective.com.
Adele Israel is a Grand Junction writer who has been involved in sustainability efforts for some 20 years. Have a question or column idea for Adele? E-mail her at msdeli@bresnan.net.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Saturday, June 26, 2010
Ritter’s legacy clean on energy
Ritter’s legacy clean on energy
By Charles Ashby
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Gov. Bill Ritter says he doesn’t care what his legacy will be when he leaves office in January, but it’s clear what that is.
The new-energy economy.
So it was fitting earlier this month, on the last day Ritter had to sign the final bills of his administration, that the governor chose to enact legislation dealing with renewable energy and job-training programs related to the emerging industry in the state.
“What I believe is that we could chart a whole different path on clean energy and that we could become a national model for what could happen in developing clean energy in the United States,” Ritter said. “I’ve signed 56 bills that are public policy matters that do more than just start this. We’ve moved such a long way in the direction of garnering international attention where clean energy development is concerned.”
Momentum for renewable energy began building with a ballot question in 2004 to enact a standard, which required the state’s main power companies to generate at least 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources, such as wind, biomass and solar.
But since Ritter came to office in 2006, he’s pushed that standard first to 20 percent, and now 30 percent, in part because such power companies as Xcel Energy told him they were years ahead in meeting it and would have no trouble doing more.
At the same time, Ritter and the Legislature enacted laws meant to encourage renewable energy use and train Coloradans to work at the wind farms, turbine factories, biomass facilities and solar power plants that have started cropping up around the state.
Some of the state’s leading environmental groups have had a field day over the past few years in seeing Colorado focus on renewable energy as never before.
“One of the most exciting things about having Ritter champion renewable energy is we’ve been able to make huge steps forward on policy matters that’s helped build a movement to doing more, which I think is an important part of his legacy,” said Pam Kiely, program director for Environment Colorado. “Having clean energy on his radar screen has gotten others thinking about it. People have invested a lot into it now, so there’s an incredible amount of momentum.”
Though Kiely worries that momentum might wane depending on who the next governor is, she doesn’t believe it will go away.
Democrat John Hickenlooper and the two GOP candidates for governor said they would continue to focus on clean energy, though each said the state shouldn’t turn its back on natural gas, oil and coal.
Hickenlooper spokesman George Merritt said Ritter has laid the foundation for clean energy, saying Colorado is starting to reap the benefits from it and the next governor needs to carry that forward.
“Colorado has branded itself as an innovator in clean energy,” Merritt said. “We want to build on that as we would every sector of the energy business.”
But the Republican candidates, former U.S. congressman Scott McInnis and Evergreen businessman Dan Maes, said that while the governor’s push to expand renewable sources in the state is laudable, it’s been done at the expense of the old energy economy.
“I appreciate the theory of new and renewable energy and it should be part of our energy platform as we move forward, but Bill Ritter almost destroyed our legacy energy industries — natural gas, oil and uranium — at the expense of his agenda,” Maes said. “It was way out of balance. We must have good access and production of our legacy industries while we develop new energy.”
McInnis echoed those sentiments, saying that electricity from renewable energy is a small part of the state’s resources.
Problem is, it’s not sustainable, at least not yet, he said.
“All energy’s got to be looked at and it’s got to be sustainable,” McInnis said. “We are a long ways off from sustainability on renewables. We’ve got to be realistic about this. Rule No. 1 is you’ve got to protect the ratepayer. You can’t have imaginary goals.”
McInnis said renewable energy won’t reach sustainability unless there’s more of a market for it, but Xcel spokesman Tom Henley said that’s what the renewable standard, tax rebates and other new programs are designed to do.
In addition to creating its own clean-energy sources, Xcel buys electricity from such private renewable projects as solar fields in the San Luis Valley and wind farms on the eastern plains.
“We wouldn’t have agreed to a standard if we didn’t think we could meet it,” Henley said. “We’re strong supporters of renewable energy.”
Ritter said pushing clean energy has helped the state clear the air, create jobs and boost rural economies, something that’s become especially crucial as the nation claws its way out of the worst recession in decades.
He said it would be foolhardy for the next governor to turn his back on all that progress.
“If you look at all of the things that we did, whether it’s energy efficiency or net metering or incentivizing the build-out of transmission lines, we have done the things we said we were going to do,” Ritter said.
“So anybody who looks at the sum total of the jobs and the kind of economic development we’ve been able to do around those jobs and the level of income that’s a result of it, they would be on a fool’s errand to do anything other than wildly promote it.”
By Charles Ashby
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Gov. Bill Ritter says he doesn’t care what his legacy will be when he leaves office in January, but it’s clear what that is.
The new-energy economy.
So it was fitting earlier this month, on the last day Ritter had to sign the final bills of his administration, that the governor chose to enact legislation dealing with renewable energy and job-training programs related to the emerging industry in the state.
“What I believe is that we could chart a whole different path on clean energy and that we could become a national model for what could happen in developing clean energy in the United States,” Ritter said. “I’ve signed 56 bills that are public policy matters that do more than just start this. We’ve moved such a long way in the direction of garnering international attention where clean energy development is concerned.”
Momentum for renewable energy began building with a ballot question in 2004 to enact a standard, which required the state’s main power companies to generate at least 15 percent of their electricity from renewable sources, such as wind, biomass and solar.
But since Ritter came to office in 2006, he’s pushed that standard first to 20 percent, and now 30 percent, in part because such power companies as Xcel Energy told him they were years ahead in meeting it and would have no trouble doing more.
At the same time, Ritter and the Legislature enacted laws meant to encourage renewable energy use and train Coloradans to work at the wind farms, turbine factories, biomass facilities and solar power plants that have started cropping up around the state.
Some of the state’s leading environmental groups have had a field day over the past few years in seeing Colorado focus on renewable energy as never before.
“One of the most exciting things about having Ritter champion renewable energy is we’ve been able to make huge steps forward on policy matters that’s helped build a movement to doing more, which I think is an important part of his legacy,” said Pam Kiely, program director for Environment Colorado. “Having clean energy on his radar screen has gotten others thinking about it. People have invested a lot into it now, so there’s an incredible amount of momentum.”
Though Kiely worries that momentum might wane depending on who the next governor is, she doesn’t believe it will go away.
Democrat John Hickenlooper and the two GOP candidates for governor said they would continue to focus on clean energy, though each said the state shouldn’t turn its back on natural gas, oil and coal.
Hickenlooper spokesman George Merritt said Ritter has laid the foundation for clean energy, saying Colorado is starting to reap the benefits from it and the next governor needs to carry that forward.
“Colorado has branded itself as an innovator in clean energy,” Merritt said. “We want to build on that as we would every sector of the energy business.”
But the Republican candidates, former U.S. congressman Scott McInnis and Evergreen businessman Dan Maes, said that while the governor’s push to expand renewable sources in the state is laudable, it’s been done at the expense of the old energy economy.
“I appreciate the theory of new and renewable energy and it should be part of our energy platform as we move forward, but Bill Ritter almost destroyed our legacy energy industries — natural gas, oil and uranium — at the expense of his agenda,” Maes said. “It was way out of balance. We must have good access and production of our legacy industries while we develop new energy.”
McInnis echoed those sentiments, saying that electricity from renewable energy is a small part of the state’s resources.
Problem is, it’s not sustainable, at least not yet, he said.
“All energy’s got to be looked at and it’s got to be sustainable,” McInnis said. “We are a long ways off from sustainability on renewables. We’ve got to be realistic about this. Rule No. 1 is you’ve got to protect the ratepayer. You can’t have imaginary goals.”
McInnis said renewable energy won’t reach sustainability unless there’s more of a market for it, but Xcel spokesman Tom Henley said that’s what the renewable standard, tax rebates and other new programs are designed to do.
In addition to creating its own clean-energy sources, Xcel buys electricity from such private renewable projects as solar fields in the San Luis Valley and wind farms on the eastern plains.
“We wouldn’t have agreed to a standard if we didn’t think we could meet it,” Henley said. “We’re strong supporters of renewable energy.”
Ritter said pushing clean energy has helped the state clear the air, create jobs and boost rural economies, something that’s become especially crucial as the nation claws its way out of the worst recession in decades.
He said it would be foolhardy for the next governor to turn his back on all that progress.
“If you look at all of the things that we did, whether it’s energy efficiency or net metering or incentivizing the build-out of transmission lines, we have done the things we said we were going to do,” Ritter said.
“So anybody who looks at the sum total of the jobs and the kind of economic development we’ve been able to do around those jobs and the level of income that’s a result of it, they would be on a fool’s errand to do anything other than wildly promote it.”
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Writers on the Range: Energy exporters: Stay out of the San Luis Valley
Writers on the Range: Energy exporters: Stay out of the San Luis Valley
BY CEAL SMITH
WRITERS ON THE RANGE,
Before utility executives and solar-energy prospectors discovered the San Luis Valley in southern Colorado, it was mostly known for its potatoes, Buddhist hermitages and scrappy water wars. Now our high-desert rift valley is home to a clash between two competing visions for Colorado's renewable energy future.
As utilities and their regulators argue over who is to blame for lagging renewable energy portfolios, a solution can be found right where I live. The San Luis Valley once again points the way towards solar innovation. When the first energy crisis shook the country in the 1970s, back-to-the-land visionaries fired up about solar electricity flocked to the this valley, where cheap land, lax building codes and high-altitude sunny skies offered the perfect solar playing field.
Among them was Marianne North, the daughter of J.K. Ramstetter, an early solar energy inventor from Golden, Colo. Within a decade, North and her small band of solar pioneers had installed over 1,000 solar systems. The many versions including passive, active or hybrid, connected to the electric grid or not, and both air and water-cooled, were all based in the small communities of San Luis, Alamosa and Crestone.
The Solar Energy Research Institute — now the National Renewable Energy Lab in Boulder, Colo. — credited the San Luis Valley back then with inspiring “an explosion in solar energy resulting in perhaps the highest per capita concentration of solar installations in the country.” Energy sovereignty was a shared goal, driven by an ethos of self-reliance common among the offspring of Spanish and Anglo settlers who colonized this remote Shangri–la in the 1800s.
Over time, solar experiments in the valley grew bigger, bolder and more sophisticated. When the 8 megawatt (MW) SunEdison plant went online in April 2007, the valley became home to one of the largest solar photovoltaic farms in the country. Three years later, the valley is close to generating a whopping 63 megawatts of solar electricity, enough to power 100 percent of the average electricity needs of 50,000 people living on its widely dispersed farms, ranches and small towns. To many of us living here, the valley is doing everything right to become the first grid-supported energy-independent region in the nation.
But not if the utility industry has its way.
One of the country's major electricity suppliers, Xcel Energy, along with Tri-State Generation and Transmission, wants to turn this mosaic of wetlands, sand dunes and Spanish Colonial-era rural farmlands into a solar-energy sacrifice zone. Xcel, which brings power to eight states over 17,335 miles of power lines, thinks big when it comes to solar. Solar power companies are proposing giant collector fields — as big as 15 miles square — to fuel its power plants and hook onto the grid. This is an industrial model that's the antithesis of the small-scale, local solar power envisioned by the valley's first energy innovators.
Energy prophet Amory Lovins calls central energy generation the “Victorian steam locomotives” of the new millennium. Here in the San Luis Valley, we propose something better: to distribute community-based power from the sun, with no new powerlines chewing up the scenery. Solar photovoltaics, microturbines, fuel cells and other decentralized clean energy technologies are now evolving faster than you can Google “free the grid.” Collectively, these new micro-grid tools are rendering the energy sovereignty dream a reality. As prices plummet, slapping solar panels on our sun-baked urban rooftops, parking lots, center pivot corners and other unused lands at the point where the energy is used, is now the cheapest, fastest, smartest and greenest path to a renewable energy future.
But Xcel Energy and Tri-State do not share this vision. Instead, they want to rip a 95-mile, $200 million high-voltage transmission line through the rugged Sangre de Cristo Mountains to siphon energy generated from the valley's sunshine to Front Range “energy markets,” hundreds of miles away.
To an eclectic coalition of solar devotees, farmers, ranchers, scientists, environmentalists, doctors, artists and retirees, this is nothing less than an invasion of solar industrialists. Our goal is to stop the transmission line by banding together: The coalition calls itself the San Luis Valley Renewable Communities Alliance. What we support is state-of-the-art microgrid technologies to empower communities within the valley and across the state to generate their own power on the existing grid.
We're working to create a model of sustainability and self-reliance that can inspire other rural communities. We refuse to give that up to become just another example of an energy sacrifice zone.
Ceal Smith is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org). She is a biologist, sustainability consultant and member of the San Luis Valley Renewable Communities Alliance in Crestone, Colorado.
BY CEAL SMITH
WRITERS ON THE RANGE,
Before utility executives and solar-energy prospectors discovered the San Luis Valley in southern Colorado, it was mostly known for its potatoes, Buddhist hermitages and scrappy water wars. Now our high-desert rift valley is home to a clash between two competing visions for Colorado's renewable energy future.
As utilities and their regulators argue over who is to blame for lagging renewable energy portfolios, a solution can be found right where I live. The San Luis Valley once again points the way towards solar innovation. When the first energy crisis shook the country in the 1970s, back-to-the-land visionaries fired up about solar electricity flocked to the this valley, where cheap land, lax building codes and high-altitude sunny skies offered the perfect solar playing field.
Among them was Marianne North, the daughter of J.K. Ramstetter, an early solar energy inventor from Golden, Colo. Within a decade, North and her small band of solar pioneers had installed over 1,000 solar systems. The many versions including passive, active or hybrid, connected to the electric grid or not, and both air and water-cooled, were all based in the small communities of San Luis, Alamosa and Crestone.
The Solar Energy Research Institute — now the National Renewable Energy Lab in Boulder, Colo. — credited the San Luis Valley back then with inspiring “an explosion in solar energy resulting in perhaps the highest per capita concentration of solar installations in the country.” Energy sovereignty was a shared goal, driven by an ethos of self-reliance common among the offspring of Spanish and Anglo settlers who colonized this remote Shangri–la in the 1800s.
Over time, solar experiments in the valley grew bigger, bolder and more sophisticated. When the 8 megawatt (MW) SunEdison plant went online in April 2007, the valley became home to one of the largest solar photovoltaic farms in the country. Three years later, the valley is close to generating a whopping 63 megawatts of solar electricity, enough to power 100 percent of the average electricity needs of 50,000 people living on its widely dispersed farms, ranches and small towns. To many of us living here, the valley is doing everything right to become the first grid-supported energy-independent region in the nation.
But not if the utility industry has its way.
One of the country's major electricity suppliers, Xcel Energy, along with Tri-State Generation and Transmission, wants to turn this mosaic of wetlands, sand dunes and Spanish Colonial-era rural farmlands into a solar-energy sacrifice zone. Xcel, which brings power to eight states over 17,335 miles of power lines, thinks big when it comes to solar. Solar power companies are proposing giant collector fields — as big as 15 miles square — to fuel its power plants and hook onto the grid. This is an industrial model that's the antithesis of the small-scale, local solar power envisioned by the valley's first energy innovators.
Energy prophet Amory Lovins calls central energy generation the “Victorian steam locomotives” of the new millennium. Here in the San Luis Valley, we propose something better: to distribute community-based power from the sun, with no new powerlines chewing up the scenery. Solar photovoltaics, microturbines, fuel cells and other decentralized clean energy technologies are now evolving faster than you can Google “free the grid.” Collectively, these new micro-grid tools are rendering the energy sovereignty dream a reality. As prices plummet, slapping solar panels on our sun-baked urban rooftops, parking lots, center pivot corners and other unused lands at the point where the energy is used, is now the cheapest, fastest, smartest and greenest path to a renewable energy future.
But Xcel Energy and Tri-State do not share this vision. Instead, they want to rip a 95-mile, $200 million high-voltage transmission line through the rugged Sangre de Cristo Mountains to siphon energy generated from the valley's sunshine to Front Range “energy markets,” hundreds of miles away.
To an eclectic coalition of solar devotees, farmers, ranchers, scientists, environmentalists, doctors, artists and retirees, this is nothing less than an invasion of solar industrialists. Our goal is to stop the transmission line by banding together: The coalition calls itself the San Luis Valley Renewable Communities Alliance. What we support is state-of-the-art microgrid technologies to empower communities within the valley and across the state to generate their own power on the existing grid.
We're working to create a model of sustainability and self-reliance that can inspire other rural communities. We refuse to give that up to become just another example of an energy sacrifice zone.
Ceal Smith is a contributor to Writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (hcn.org). She is a biologist, sustainability consultant and member of the San Luis Valley Renewable Communities Alliance in Crestone, Colorado.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Xcel wants to reduce solar projections
Xcel wants to reduce solar projections
By Charles Ashby
Saturday, June 5, 2010
Xcel Energy wants the state to allow it to reduce by nearly half its promise to generate more electricity from solar sources.
The utility company asked the Colorado Public Utilities Commission on Friday for permission to reduce by 48 percent the solar generation targets it agreed to under Xcel’s 2007 Colorado Resource Plan.
Company officials said it wants to reduce to 185 megawatts, from the originally approved 335 megawatts by 2015, the amount of solar power primarily because of the lack of transmission lines in the San Luis Valley.
Karen Hyde, Xcel’s vice president for regulatory matters, said the request is temporary, at least until transmission capacity catches up with power generation.
“Our commitment to the development of solar resources from the San Luis Valley over the long term has not changed,” she said in a statement. “But because we cannot guarantee the ability to move power to the grid when these solar resources become available, we are compelled to step back from our original plans and seek this reduction.”
Xcel had hoped to have a new transmission line in service in the valley by 2013, but delays have made that unlikely, Hyde said.
She said the company is going forward with other aspects of its 2007 plan, including natural gas, wind and solar projects elsewhere in the state.
The company recently announced two major wind-power projects in New Raymer and Limon on the Eastern Plains that are to generate about 500 megawatts of electricity, and it reached an agreement to provide 900 megawatts from two natural gas sources.
It is unknown when the utilities commission will rule on the request.
By Charles Ashby
Saturday, June 5, 2010
Xcel Energy wants the state to allow it to reduce by nearly half its promise to generate more electricity from solar sources.
The utility company asked the Colorado Public Utilities Commission on Friday for permission to reduce by 48 percent the solar generation targets it agreed to under Xcel’s 2007 Colorado Resource Plan.
Company officials said it wants to reduce to 185 megawatts, from the originally approved 335 megawatts by 2015, the amount of solar power primarily because of the lack of transmission lines in the San Luis Valley.
Karen Hyde, Xcel’s vice president for regulatory matters, said the request is temporary, at least until transmission capacity catches up with power generation.
“Our commitment to the development of solar resources from the San Luis Valley over the long term has not changed,” she said in a statement. “But because we cannot guarantee the ability to move power to the grid when these solar resources become available, we are compelled to step back from our original plans and seek this reduction.”
Xcel had hoped to have a new transmission line in service in the valley by 2013, but delays have made that unlikely, Hyde said.
She said the company is going forward with other aspects of its 2007 plan, including natural gas, wind and solar projects elsewhere in the state.
The company recently announced two major wind-power projects in New Raymer and Limon on the Eastern Plains that are to generate about 500 megawatts of electricity, and it reached an agreement to provide 900 megawatts from two natural gas sources.
It is unknown when the utilities commission will rule on the request.
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