Why Start a Clean Energy Business in Massachusetts? Event

The British American Business Council of New England’s (BABCNE) Environment and Energy Committee hosts “Why Start a Clean Energy Business in Massachusetts?” featuring Phil Giudice, Commissioner of the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER).

The Massachusetts DOER has created a fertile landscape in the Commonwealth in order to grow our Clean Energy jobs, businesses and future. After 2 1/2 years of leadership as Commissioner, collaborating with industry leaders, Phil Giudice has established intelligent, progressive energy policies driving energy efficiency and renewable energy across the state. At our November event, Nick d’Arbeloff, President, New England Clean Energy Council stated that the Massachusetts DOER “has moved us from the middle to the top of the class in Clean Energy.”

Don’t miss this opportunity to register and join us on Tuesday evening, January 26, 2010 at 5:00 pm at the LEED Platinum rated Genzyme Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. There is a nominal fee to cover costs.

“Philip Giudice is responsible for implementing energy policies that ensure an adequate supply of reliable, affordable and clean energy for the businesses and residents of Massachusetts. He is also responsible for improving and streamlining energy regulation, promoting greater efficiency in all energy uses, reducing energy costs and mobilizing energy education. Mr Giudice also serves as board member, board executive committee member and treasurer of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative as well as a board member of the Commonwealth’s Energy Facilities Siting Board.

Mr. Giudice brings diverse and expansive experience to the position. Prior to joining DOER, Commissioner Giudice served as Senior Vice President at EnerNOC, a start-up company providing electricity demand-management services to businesses, institutions, utilities, and grid operators to obtain savings for businesses and institutions and relieve stress on the electric system.

The Commissioner was also a Senior Partner and leader of Mercer Management Consulting’s global energy utilities practice. He is a geologist (B.S. from the University of New Hampshire and M.S. in Economic Geology from the University of Arizona) and management professional (M.B.A. from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth) with 30 years experience in the energy industry.”

This event is sponsored by Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge LLP.

Disclosure: I am a founding member of the BABCNE Environment and Energy Committee.

The New Energy Challenge Event

The British American Business Council of New England (BABCNE) invites you to a Distinguished Business Leaders series evening forum to meet David Brewster, President, EnerNOC. Please join us for “The New Energy Challenge: Think Green to be Green” on Thursday evening, January 14, 2010, at the offices of Bingham McCutchen LLP at One Federal Street, Boston, Massachusetts.

Please RSVP to babcne@comcast.net for this complimentary event while seats last. I look forward to seeing you.

“As president and Co-Founder of EnerNOC, David Brewster has guided the company’s execution since its inception in 2001. He currently oversees the organization’s regulatory affairs and international development efforts. In this capacity, he has taken an active role in helping to shape domestic and international demand response markets and pioneered efforts to make customer participation in these markets more effective through improved market rules, better data communications and enhanced automation technologies.”

Disclosure: I am a founding member of the BABCNE Environment and Energy Committee.

Public Capital Summary

It’s never easy to pull together an event but sometimes the planets align and you end up at the Genzyme Center’s state of the art auditorium with a stimulating mix of viewpoints from four terrific panelists and a full house of smart and engaging attendees who ask thoughtful questions. From my obviously unbiased viewpoint, the BABCNE Environment and Energy Committee’s “Public Capital for Cleantech in the U.S. and U.K.: Untangling Public Capital and the Stimulus” event was about as good as it gets.

GENZYME CENTER

We were fortunate to have Rick Mattila, Director of Environmental Affairs at Genzyme, give us a tour and walk us through a presentation and commentary just before our panel discussion.

The quick story regarding the Genzyme Center is that it:

– Uses 34% less water than a comparable building.
– Costs 42% less for electricity than a comparable building.
– Used more than 75% recycled material for it’s construction.
– Used almost all Forest Stewardship Council certified wood.
– Recycled more than 90% of it’s construction waste.

MAIN EVENT

Navigant Consulting sponsored the Public Capital event and Forrest Small, Director in the Energy Practice at Navigant was our adept moderator. Rob Dietel, Vice Consul, UK Trade and Investment at the British Consulate General told us that the U.K. began funding Clean Energy projects in 2001 and has become smarter and more surgical due to their experience. The U.K. and U.S. both have a balance of private and public funding for Clean Energy projects.

The cleanest energy is the energy that does not have to be generated. Vivek Mohta, Director of Energy Markets at the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources, stated that $2 billion has been allocated to be spent over the next three years for energy efficiency which makes Massachusetts number one per capita in the nation. Nick d’Arbeloff, President of the New England Clean Energy Council, mentioned that Ian Bowles and Vivek are two of our government leaders responsible for moving Massachusetts to the head of the class in Clean Energy and elicited thankful applause from the audience.

Gideon Gradman, VP of Corporate Development at Ze-gen, who completed his undergraduate and graduate degrees in St. Louis and Chicago respectively and had earlier career experience in oil and gas, believes the debate in Washington over the Senate bill is a healthy one. He voiced some sentiments similar to those in my post on COAL emphasizing the importance of embracing the full spectrum of cleaner energy options including making our existing energy generation, overwhelmingly from fossil fuels, cleaner.

I have heard Congressman Markey and Energy Secretary Chu explain the importance of getting even a weak carbon cap and trade bill through congress in order to establish a framework for reducing carbon. Nick d’Arbeloff spent some time outlining this bigger picture perspective. He stated “that a price signal for carbon is critical to unleash private capital toward the goal of reducing it.” Once the framework is established, future amendments will be passed lowering the carbon cap as the free market accelerates the de-carbonization of our economy.

Todd Burger, using published remarks by T. Boone Pickens, asked one of the more intriguing questions from the audience regarding U.S. dollars paid abroad for oil. Using a 10 million barrel per day import quantity at $100 per barrel, the U.S. will pay about $3.65 trillion abroad for foreign crude oil over the next decade. What if we kept that money in the U.S.?

Disclosure: I am a founding member of the BABCNE Environment and Energy Committee and was chair of this Public Capital event.

Public Capital Event

The British American Business Council of New England’s (BABCNE) Environment and Energy Committee hosts “Public Capital for Cleantech in the U.S. and U.K.: Untangling Public Capital and the Stimulus” on Tuesday evening, November 17, 2009, at the Genzyme Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Our first event in September was sold out, but there are still seats available for the “Public Capital” event. Register now and join us at 5:00 pm for a tour of the LEED Platinum rated Genzyme Center. There is a nominal fee to cover costs.

This event is the second in a series of five events to promote Cleantech opportunities. Along with our January 26, 2010 sister event on “Raising Private Capital for Cleantech in the U.S. and U.K.: Which technologies, products and companies are attracting capital?”, these two events cover the full spectrum of Cleantech funding opportunities.

Moderator:

Forrest Small, Director, Navigant Consulting

Panelists:

Nick d’Arbeloff, President, New England Clean Energy Council
Rob Dietel, Vice Consul, UK Trade and Investment
Gideon Gradman, Vice President of Corporate Development, Ze-gen
Vivek Mohta, Director of Energy Markets, Massachusetts DOER

Disclosure: I am a founding member of the BABCNE Environment and Energy Committee.

COAL

As I cycled up my road on this Indian summer day, I looked up toward our house to see my son’s pastel-coloured laundry on the clothesline silhouetted in the foreground of an amazing fall foliage scene. The overlaid cacophony of bird cries as they amassed in trees and flight during their fall dance ritual was in stark contrast to my thoughts about the future of COAL in our world.

If you are serious about a global sustainable energy and environment balance you absolutely must understand the use of coal for electricity generation. Globally, it is responsible for 37% of our electricity and has a 5.4% annual growth rate. Coal is the largest and fastest growing energy source for electricity generation.

Energy Source ( % of Global Electricity / Annual Growth Rate % )

– Nuclear ( 1% / 0.2% )
– Oil ( 9 / 1.4 )
– Natural Gas ( 19 / 3.0 )
– Hydro ( 20 / 3.1 )
– Coal (37 / 5.4 )

At the HBS Energy Symposium two weekends ago, Fredrick Palmer, SVP at Peabody Energy provided us with some of these facts on coal. He supports an 80% reduction in green house gases (GHG) by 2050 in the U.S., but emphasized that this goal is only achievable through the use of carbon capture and storage technology.

In the U.S. after the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, coal became the U.S. energy source of choice to ensure economic and reliable electricity supply. Our total U.S. energy usage includes an approximately 50% dependence on coal for electricity.

From 2010 to 2030, the global population is expected to grow from 6.8 billion people to 8.2 billion people. There is a very strong correlation between electricity availability and use AND people living longer and better lives. At the same time, the use of coal to produce electricity is a health problem and environmental problem from mountain top mining to air pollution to GHG emissions.

Wednesday I visited GreatPoint Energy’s Mayflower Clean Energy Center in Somerset, Massachusetts with Cleantech colleagues and the MIT Energy Club for a tour and presentation. GreatPoint Energy has built a pilot plant to demonstrate the commercialization of hydromethanation technology to manufacture pipeline quality natural gas from low cost coal, petroleum coke and biomass. A few technical challenges remain, but this concept promises a 50% reduction in emissions versus coal-fired power plants and is funded by major energy players including Dow Chemical, the largest natural gas user, AES, the largest energy producer, Peabody Energy, the largest private coal producer, and Suncor, the largest petroleum coke producer.

Unlike oil that at higher prices will bring about economic advantages to switch to alternative fuels, coal will continue to be the most economic choice for electricity generation in India, China and the U.S. where it is found in abundance. Coal was the energy source for 65% of the increase in energy production in China between 1990 and 2005.

Currently, an additional 700 Million Tons Per Annum (MTPA) of coal, 70% of the total supply of coal for U.S. electricity generation, is required to keep up with the coal-fired power plants being built around the world annually. We MUST make coal “cleaner” to use for electricity generation for the foreseeable future.

Jim Rogers and Duke Energy

I had the privilege of attending the HBS Energy Symposium yesterday and although sobered by Frederick Palmer’s Peabody Energy opening keynote about the necessity of using abundant and cheap coal for our global energy requirements (look for my post later this week), I was inspired by James Rogers and his commitment to the environment. Jim Rogers is the Chairman, President and CEO of Duke Energy and he measures his success by what his grandchildren will tell their grandchildren about his efforts today to solve our CO2 emissions problem.

Rogers believes that all people deserve access to electricity and he is working at Duke Energy, on Capitol Hill and in Copenhagen to provide it and to reduce emissions at the same time. His afternoon keynote covered a lot of Cleantech categories, but I decided to post it under Smart Grid because Jim Rogers and Duke Energy are doing a lot of Smart Thinking. Duke Energy is operating as if the U.S. and Copenhagen climate change initiatives already had been enacted.

The primary objectives for the company are to modernize and decarbonize their power generation AND to make their communities served as energy efficient as possible. Rogers has added these goals to the historical mandates of economic and reliable energy for customers. Duke Energy produces 96% of it’s power from coal and nuclear generating plants.

From 2010 to 2050, Duke Energy’s entire fleet of generating plants will be replaced since the average plant life is 40 years. What plants should be built to replace their existing fleet? He mentioned coal, nuclear, natural gas and renewables, but emphasized the need for technological solutions to achieve environmental parity. Coal requires carbon capture and storage (CCS), natural gas only halves the CO2 emissions of coal, and renewables require energy storage if used on a large scale due to the intermittent supply of solar and wind power.

In an effort to learn more about distributed generation and support CO2 emissions-reducing capital outlays for their customers who earn, on average, approximately $40,000/year, Duke Energy is funding residential solar panel installations. Rogers wants to shift the company from “generation to the meter to generation to the application” thinking. Duke Energy is working with technology start-ups and he sees the company becoming a distributor of smart technologies to their customers. He also believes that today’s energy efficiency measures will be considered primitive in 5-10 years.

In a recent pilot program conducted with 40 customers, energy consumption was reduced by 20% without customers perceiving any change in usage. A suite of smart ideas were implemented to achieve this reduction.

On the international stage, Rogers believes that ultimately an agreement between the U.S. and China who together are responsible for 50% of CO2 emissions in the world could be a catalyst for significant progress. He also believes that building a “ladder of cooperation” rung by rung between U.S. and Chinese companies will foster a closer relationship between the two countries required for an agreement. Actions speak louder than words and China is or will soon be number one in photovoltaic, battery and wind turbine production.

The time for “half measures” is over. The time for wind, but not eminent domain or for natural gas, but not if it comes from offshore is over. We also need to realize that “every job is a green job”. Everyone can and must do what he or she does every day more energy efficiently. The transition will not be cheap or easy or quick, but it must be fair and it must begin now.

Rogers emphasized the need for “cathedral thinking” where, for example, three generations built Notre Dame over 100 years based on “vision, commitment and faith”. His even better analogy was the Cathedral of Florence which was worked on for over 100 years before anyone knew how to build the massive dome to complete the cathedral. Brunelleschi won the dome competition by inventing the Dome design approximately 100 years after the cathedral was started! Rogers wants us to employ “cathedral thinking” in China time since we don’t have 100 years to solve the problem.

Jim Rogers is a stronger believer in technology to make smart energy decisions for us than in all of us constantly thinking about and making wise decisions about energy use at home.

Energy Efficiency for Vehicles

The U.S. has framed our climate change problem as one where we will have to reduce 80% of our CO2 emissions by 2050. We typically look at today’s tools to get there, but we are also optimistic that 40 years of innovation supported by policy will get us to a sustainable future. We are exploring electric vehicles driven by renewable energy as well as biofuels, compressed natural gas (CNG) and propane. To reduce CO2 emissions in structures in the near term, we are addressing energy efficiency in homes, commercial buildings and industrial facilities. What are the comparable energy efficiency measures for vehicles?

At the Fifth Annual AltWheels Fleet Day at Staples World Headquarters in Framingham, Massachusetts on October 5, 2009, I learned about some energy efficiency ideas implemented in vehicle fleets. Alison Sander founded Altwheels to help find more sustainable ways to meet our transportation and mobility needs. This event brings together more than 200 Fleet Managers and Transportation experts to look at transportation alternatives and best practices. Alison leads the Center for Sensing and Mining the Future at the Boston Consulting Group. She is also a Board Member of the World Resources Institute.

Mike Payette, Fleet Equipment Manager at Staples, announced some intriguing fleet modifications which I view as energy efficiency for vehicles:

SPEED

Staples has now installed and set controllers at a maximum of 60 mph for their fleet increasing mpg about 25% from 8.5 to 10.5 mpg. At speeds under 60 mph the more costly and difficult to implement aerodynamic nose cones are not beneficial. This policy change at Staples saves 500,000 gallons of diesel and reduces CO2 emissions by 6000 tons annually.

IDLING

CV-MARC Idle Limiting systems have also been implemented to shut down vehicles after they idle for three minutes. This resulted in an additional 5% mpg increase or roughly 0.5 mpg.

ACCELERATING

The Smart Truck EC controller enforces gradual acceleration on vehicles. This technology was installed the previous week on the Staple’s fleet so the impact has not yet been quantified. The idea is to reduce the rate at which the mass of the vehicle is projected forward to save diesel and reduce emissions. At speeds between 0 and 25 mph, only 60% of the fuel called for by the accelerator pedal is provided to the engine. At speeds between 26 and 35 mph, 75% of the fuel called for is provided.

In addition to the leadership work in these categories at Staples, I was also encouraged to hear of progress on another important energy efficiency category in vehicles:

MASS

Merck has changed it’s fleet from 6 to 4 cylinder sedans in addition to reducing the number of vehicles in it’s fleet from 9,000 to 6,000. Wheels Incorporated, with 300,000 vehicles under management, is also moving from 6 to 4 cylinder vehicles.

A few months ago I drove the old 2000-2006 Honda Insight. This vehicle used current proven technologies at the time, but focused on a low weight, aerodynamic and gas-electric hybrid design. I drove it for 45 minutes, half on highways and half on back roads, and averaged 75 mpg! Today, an OEM could use the same approach and provide triple digit mpg.

Please watch this 15 minute TED video by Amory Lovins on Winning the Oil Endgame.

Energy Density

I attended an Environmental Business Council (EBC) event at the Public Service of New Hampshire’s (PSNH) Northern Wood Power at Schiller Station in Portsmouth, New Hampshire on Tuesday. Station Manager Dick Despins gave us a comprehensive presentation and tour. PSNH’s 50 megawatt biomass facility is one of the largest renewal energy facilities in the U.S. including a nine story high, 110 feet tall, boiler. It is fed primarily “clean” wood chips from a distance of up to 100 miles in a geographical half circle as Schiller Station is on the coast.

Large tractor trailers, after being hydraulically raised to a 70 degree angle, release as much as 30 tons of wood chips into hoppers. The material is screened and anything bigger than a wood chip gets run through a “hog” that mashes larger pieces into a more digestible size. These chips are deposited into a mountain range of material stored under a large rectangular roof and dropped onto a moving conveyor using a sophisticated paddle conveyor. There is a magnetic screen that separates out barbed wire, nails, etc. Another mountainous configuration of material is stored outside. Together the indoor and outdoor storage provide a 10 day supply of wood chips.

The benefits include significantly lower emissions compared to the replaced coal boiler and PSNH dollars now flow to the local economy for wood chips rather than to the overseas economy for coal. Customer rates were not impacted. The $75 million investment is being funded, in large part, by renewable energy certificates (RECs) that provided $15 million in the first year of operation and currently provide $9 million per year at the $30 per REC rate.

The volume of material required to provide power to about 50,000 homes is staggering as the new fluidized-bed boiler uses 70 tons of wood chips per hour around the clock. I was overwhelmed to think what it would take to provide this type of renewable energy on a national scale. Using some rough math assuming 300 million people in the U.S. and an average two people per household, this facility is providing 1/3000th of the U.S.’s home power requirements. A friend of mine forwarded me the following energy density chart from GridSolar that plots the acres, in half acre increments, required to deliver an annual megawatt-hour (MWh) of different types of renewable energy. The coal and natural gas columns should be viewed separately as they are obviously not renewables.

Economic Prosperity

The Senate debate in Washington over the climate bill and the global debate on climate change as we move toward Copenhagen are difficult and uncertain. Is it time to use the economic prosperity argument as the primary argument to win these debates both domestically and internationally?

Professor William Moomaw, Director of the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy at The Fletcher School at Tufts University, weighed in on this distinction in his talk entitled “A Global Overview of Action on Climate Change” two weeks ago in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He stated that one of the biggest likely impediments to a meaningful agreement in Copenhagen is India’s position. India has promised not to exceed the emissions per person in the U.S. India’s emissions rate is currently about 2 tons of carbon dioxide equivalent per year (CO2e/y) per person and the U.S.’s is about 24 tons of CO2e/y per person. Moomaw goes on to wonder if the message of economic prosperity is a better global argument than the message of climate change.

President Obama has given two speeches during his presidency regarding these topics of economic prosperity and climate change. His first speech largely regarding economic prosperity was entitled Remarks by the President on Clean Energy on April 22, 2009. His first speech to the UN General Assembly at the UN Summit on Climate Change this week was more focused on climate change. I encourage you to scroll to the bottom of the webpage and watch the 10 minute video of his latest address.

I think it is time to incorporate not only the climate change argument, but also and primarily the economic prosperity argument to win the debates in Washington and Copenhagen as well as in our own circles of influence.

Note: Grist is an excellent news and information source.

The Utility of the Future Event

“Steve Holliday, Chief Executive, National Grid, will share his vision of the utility of the future in a new era of a carbon constrained economy. He will touch on regulatory and financial implications faced by the utility and the challenges and opportunities for businesses in both the U.S. and U.K. National Grid is an international gas and electric utility with operations throughout the U.K. and northeast U.S.”

The British American Business Council of New England’s (BABCNE) newly formed Environment and Energy Committee hosts “The Utility of the Future” on Tuesday evening, September 22, 2009, at the British Consulate-General in Cambridge, Massachusetts. This event is the first in a series of five events planned by the committee over the next nine months. It is sold out, but pay attention to the BABCNE website regarding our next event entitled “Public Capital for Cleantech in the U.S. and U.K.: Untangling Public Capital and the Stimulus” on November 17, 2009.

Disclosure: I am a founding member of the BABCNE Environment and Energy Committee.