Month: June 2009

TheBostonChannel.com

BOSTON – A local college is going green to save green.

NewsCenter 5’s David Brown reported that Pine Manor students are leading the way in energy savings.

You could call Annesah Cameron and Wislende Cherefant campus crusaders for the reduction of carbon. The students are calculating the college’s carbon footprint.

They are part of an environmental movement on campus that not only saves energy, but is also saving the small but diverse liberal arts college a lot of money.

“When one person does it, it becomes a movement and more people can follow behind. I think it’s a really good thing, and as far as the earth, I think it’s helping the earth a lot because we all know what’s going on,” Cameron said.

“Even taking small steps as an individual or as a college, you can make a contribution to the planet, which is our ultimate common good,” Pine Manor President Gloria Nemerowicz said.

The small steps started last year when Pine Manor College tapped Joe Kennedy and Citizens Energy to help them with energy savings.

Rising energy costs were hurting the school’s ability to provide scholarships to the student body. With the help of Citizens Energy, the 500 students embarked on an aggressive energy conservation campaign.

“Universities themselves are trying to save costs. The one place where you can do this and save literally tens of thousands of dollars is in your energy use,” Kennedy said.

Low-flow faucets and shower heads were installed and the buildings’ mechanics were upgraded. By spending less than $1 million, the college is saving $350,000 a year.

It is good to see Citizens Energy has stuck with the Sunrise Powerlink project. The Massachusetts-based nonprofit is working with San Diego Gas & Electric to pay for the cost of running the lines through Imperial County. Citizens will pay for half of those costs, which will be in the millions of dollars.

That is good news for SDG&E because the partnership will obviously save it some cash. But it is potentially even better for the people of the Valley, as Citizens is a company that takes its profits and puts them toward helping low-income people through energy programs. Those funds and programs will be a help in Imperial County.

Citizens is no stranger to the Valley or this project, once being linked to a proposed northern route. It was founded by Joseph Kennedy II, a former Massachusetts congressman who is the son of the late Robert Kennedy. Kennedy has spent time in the Valley and understands the issues with this project well. And Citizens has shown it is focused on helping low-income people with their energy needs.

What that means in our area is programs to help teach people how to conserve energy and save money. The goal is not to simply hand out checks when an individual or family is struggling to pay electric bills. That would be a temporary relief, but would not fix the overall problem. The answer, according to Citizens, is to teach people how to conserve energy and get the most out of what they have.

That makes good sense to us. And we know there are many Valley families who could use this type of assistance.

The Sunrise Powerlink has been in talks for years, and the process at times has been very divisive and difficult, to say the least. But with the southern route nearing the start of construction ? depending on legal issues ? it is a positive that Citizens is again publicly involved (although talks with SDG&E never ended) with the project.

We are sure the construction process will take longer to begin and finish than all involved hope, but when it is completed we are confident that Imperial County families that need it most will be glad that Citizens is a partner.

Though the Imperial Irrigation District dropped out of talks to build a renewable energy transmission line from the Imperial Valley to the coast nearly two years ago, its one-time negotiating partner, Citizens Energy, is still a committed part of the project.

The non-profit group will partner with San Diego Gas & Electric to finance the construction of half the Imperial County portion of the Sunrise Powerlink, Citizens Energy Chief Operating Officer Peter Smith said Thursday.

After the line’s completion a portion of Citizens Energy’s profits from the deal will go toward low-income energy programs that will benefit Imperial Valley residents, he said.

“Despite IID’s backing out we still wanted to have a role,” Smith said.

Though construction on the 120-mile line is yet to begin, SDG&E expects the $1.9 billion line to start service in 2012.

IID spokesman Kevin Kelley portrayed the construction of the line as positive for the Imperial Valley.

“IID has always been for this project. We were for it when we were a partner and we continued to support the construction of this line to deliver renewable energy from the Imperial Valley to the coast once we were no longer a partner,” he said.

The main reason the IID ended negotiations about the partnership in 2007 was a disagreement about the route the line would take to the coast, Kelley said.

“IID was very concerned about the impact of a northern route for the Green Path South [on] its ratepayers,” he said.

The approved plan for the Sunrise Powerlink, however, calls for the line to follow the route that the IID favored.

While regulatory hurdles remain, SDG&E thinks it could break ground this year.

“This is a critical part of our ability to meet the state’s objectives in renewables,” Jim Avery, a senior vice president with the company, said of the project.

From The Indian Country Today Media Network

EAGLE BUTTE, S.D. – Home to four bands of Lakota Sioux, the 2.4 million acre Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation in north central South Dakota has tremendous potential for the development of renewable energy generation. The wind blows strong and steady here; the tribe is committed to developing its resources to provide revenues and jobs, and the Obama administration is committed to supporting green energy projects.

Eileen Briggs is president of the board of directors for Ta-tè Topa (Four Winds) Energy, a tribally-owned corporation established to develop wind resources. “Revenues from the sale of our energy, from leases and from our ownership percentage in this project, will help create another revenue source for our tribe and also provide increased services and resources for us to offer our members,” she said.

The tribe has partnered with Citizens Energy Corporation of Boston to develop the proposed 100 to 125 MW wind farm. The nonprofit, explained spokesman Brian O’Connor, has a social as well as an economic mission. “Citizens Energy does not own 100 percent of the project. We give our Native partners a 20 percent ownership right from the start. Also, there are lease and royalty payments.” O’Connor said negotiations with the tribe began about two years ago. Last December, Briggs said, the tribe made a major commitment to resource development by setting up Ta-tè Topa Energy.

The parties have just signed a joint exploratory agreement. “The exploratory joint venture agreement is a five-year arrangement to lay the groundwork for this project,” Briggs said. “We have a stake in the development end of it. This isn’t just a lease agreement where we’re going to get revenues for leasing of lands for turbines. We actually are going to have an opportunity to have a 20 percent interest in the development with a potential to grow that ownership interest over the life of the project.”

About 8,000 tribal members, of a total of roughly 14,000, live on the reservation. “For individual tribal members, one direct benefit is that there will be initial construction jobs – 100 to 200 locally. It’s not long term, but in the short term that is an impact for our individual tribal members and their families, for the reservation as a whole and for the region. We also know this project could create upwards of 20 full-time operation and maintenance positions,” Briggs said.

Not all benefits, however, are monetary. “We’re seeing a lot of people feeling really positive about renewable wind energy development because it’s forward and progressive. Our wind is with us all the time. It means a lot to know that we could have the technology in place and the resources to develop the wind, to make money for the tribe and to create a future-thinking outlook in a place of a lot of despair and hopelessness because there are no jobs.”

O’Connor said the next steps will be to collect and analyze wind data at different elevations, perform required environmental studies and take the project to investors. Federal renewable energy production tax credits, reauthorized by Congress a few months ago, will help attract financing to the project. “Most of the money for the project is expected to come from investors who want to take advantage of production tax credits,” Briggs said. Another potential source of financing is other tribes, particularly gaming tribes that want to diversify their economic development activities.

Financing, transmission capacity and a place to sell the electricity are essential to making a project like this work, and according to Briggs, some changes to federal policies and regulations are needed to level the playing field for Native American tribes looking at renewable energy. “Certain regulations and provisions need to be modified to make tribal lands attractive to investors, such as ensuring that production tax credits can be transferred and really used for projects in Indian country.

“We have to be at the table to promote wind production in Indian country, voicing our preferences, our recommendations and our priorities. We need financial incentives to get onto the existing grid, specifically tax credit allocations and accelerated depreciation for tribal wind production so we can accommodate the lead time that’s needed to get this kind of project going.

“Other issues also affect how Indian country will fare in this new era of green power, such as how the Department of Energy sites new transmission lines. “Then there’s also the issue of federal tribal wind interconnection preference and expedited approval for wind facilities on tribal lands. We need some prioritization of our projects and resolution of transmission line siting issues. Some transmission lines go right through tribal lands. We’re advocating for going beyond federal-tribal consultation, to actually have a voice as those decisions are being made.”

Briggs added that the tribe is “very excited about this opportunity. We’re ready to take this on and we ask for support and good thoughts from Indian country for a project of this size that will benefit not only our local tribes, but possibly the world through its impact on global climate change.”