Steve is the Managing Director of the Solar Energy Business Association of New England. He is organizing and will moderate a panel entitled Structural Codes for Solar Installations. Panelists include local and national experts on building construction and solar mounting systems who will focus on proper design for systems and consumer protection.

Here are 3 pieces of commonsense ideas from the folks here who know about such things – one near term and two longer term – to keep in mind and to keep you pointed in the direction that money might flow from:

1. Near term: Look for and secure utility rebates and incentives. Utility companies often offer incentives to encourage their customers to adopt energy efficiency measures. Those rebates might include rebates on the purchase of equipment, such as lighting, furnaces, or programmable thermostats, rebates on the total project cost, or cost sharing.
    
   Even if you live in a de-regulated state and you purchase electricity or natural gas from a competitive supplier (a supplier other than the local utility), you may still qualify for incentives that are offered by the distribution company (the utility) that delivers your energy supply to you.
    
   AND…even if you have taken advantage of incentives in the past, you may qualify for additional incentives to upgrade your system, such as upgrading lighting a second time with even more efficient fixtures. It never hurts to check.  Utility companies will be happy to talk to you. They usually need to meet their own targets around program participation.
    
2. Longer term: Plan for the inevitable replacement of older equipment. The time to think about improving the energy efficiency of your equipment is not that cold January data when the heating system in a school or City Hall stops functioning. But it’s typical for municipalities to use a piece of equipment, a vehicle, or a building energy system until it falls apart, and then replace it.
    
   A little advance planning could actually save money. Bring in contractors now to review the condition of your system and research the alternatives that might be available. You might find that it pays to replace your system sooner with new, efficient equipment compared to the costly repairs that an aging system would require.
    
   Even if it makes sense to wait longer to replace your system, anticipate that replacement and put money aside on a regular basis. This planning will help to mitigate the budget impact of that replacement. Starting when your equipment reaches its half life, put funds away annually within capital improvement program (CIP) or reserve funds.
    
3. Longer term: Engage citizens in energy planning and policy making. If this seems like a vague, touchy-feely piece of advice, consider this: Engaged citizens can be a cost-effective avenue to the expertise your municipality may need to figure out the current energy picture and where to make energy investments. They can also be a conduit to your broader citizen base – the people whose support you need to move capital energy projects and energy procurements forward.

One more thought, and this one is specifically about equipment purchases: Whenever you’re thinking about buying new equipment that uses energy to operate (such as boilers, ventilation, air conditioning units, street lights, or vehicles), don’t make the mistake of considering the only the sticker price of the equipment or system. Instead, compare and consider its total cost, which includes operation, maintenance, and, yes, energy use, over its expected life. It may be that the least expensive system will have a far greater impact on annual operating budgets than a more expensive but energy efficient alternative.

Whatever your community’s motivation, you still need to figure out how to get started. Addressing municipal energy use is a complex task, and the best of intentions aren’t necessarily enough to move your goals from ideas to reality.

This blog offers 4 high-level ideas to help you focus your initial efforts. It’s common-sense stuff, and when you read it, you may think “but we already knew that.” But are you working through those ideas in a methodical, structured way? If not, take this as an opportunity to revisit these foundational concepts and really figure out what they mean for your community.

It’s all about getting organized. Like any project, you need to know where you are and where you hope to go, and you need to agree on team member roles and responsibilities. Specifically:

1. Decide who is in charge. Designate an energy lead. You want your project to stay on track and be an integral part of all policy and decision-making, right? Then, put someone in charge, and make sure they have leverage and a stake in the outcome.This person monitors energy use, tracks  progress in increasing energy efficiency, and measures progress against goals. Ideally, this person has both responsibility for and the authority to affect policy and move your goals forward.
    
2. Establish an energy committee and share information about energy use and cost. A successful energy cost reduction strategy takes a village – or at least your community. So talk to these people:
   • elected officials
   • local government managers and departments
   • building users
   • maintenance staff

    
   …and bring them together.

   If you already have an energy committee, you may find that it is dominated by engaged volunteers. This is pretty common, and it’s great! These volunteer members can bring in much-needed skills and perspectives. And they can connect you to a larger base of support when it comes time to look for funding for larger projects.

   However, the additional involvement of municipal employees and elected officials can move the committee’s agenda from the sidelines to front and center, while also connecting the committee to the resources they need to move projects forward.

3. Monitor monthly energy use and cost.Remember:  You can’t manage what you don’t measure.

   There are plenty of energy reporting tools out there that will help you keep track of and understand your energy use, cost, and emissions (full disclosure, we make one of those tools, too, and you can learn about it here, if you like). Yes, collecting account information and energy bills for the initial setup can be a challenge that can range from an inconvenience to seemingly impossible. And the data can be complicated and tough to understand. But don’t panic.

   Initial setup and the task of loading historical data happens only once. Once the data is in, a good tool should make it easy to understand that data and quickly see what’s important, like which buildings are the least efficient or what your typical seasonal energy use pattern looks like. (Read our blog posting on How do you Choose an Energy Information Tool for some ideas about what to look for in one of these tools). And the ongoing tracking is much easier – just enter your bills as you get them.The results are worth it.
    

4. Involve municipal employees. People who work in and use town buildings often have great ideas for how to reduce energy use. But they are rarely asked for their opinions. Ask them and make an ally in the process!

Now, if you’re thinking, “Great, but that’s not enough. I need a list of steps!” Stay tuned. A future blog posting will include the foundational steps involved in creating a municipal energy plan.

And if you’re thinking, “I’ve got the plan. I just need the money!” we will soon offer a few high-level ideas around planning to be sure funds are available when you need them.

Dennis DiZoglio, Executive Director, Merrimack Valley Planning Commission

An energy performance contract can give a town access to new equipment without a big up-front cost – and increase their energy efficiency while making buildings more comfortable for occupants. But performance contracting is complicated, especially if you’re a small town without an energy expert on staff.

I recently sat down with someone who gets all of that in a big way: Dennis DiZoglio is the Executive Director of the Merrimack Valley Planning Commission. His member towns wanted to kick off performance contracting projects, but they had no energy expertise and just plain didn’t know where to start. He managed to find them that expertise and get a number of them moving forward by taking a regional approach to things.

Read on for the top 5 pieces of advice he has for overwhelmed, resource-constrained municipalities that want to start an energy performance contracting project:

1. Is someone else nearby already doing it? They might have done the difficult work for you.

“There is a potential to, at a minimum, learn from a neighboring community that has gone through the process and maybe talk with them about their experiences and what they’ve learned. Or talk to an RPA, a county, or whatever kind of regional structure they have to see who else is doing it, just to learn from their experiences.

“While we did our procurement for 11 communities and the 2 regional school districts, we actually made it for the entire region. If the other 4 communities in our region that did not participate wanted to participate later, they could.

“That way, if someone came to me and said, ‘Gee I heard you guys recently did an ESCO,’ we could say, ‘Yes but you can still participate. You don’t even have to do the procurement if you don’t want to. You can just piggyback on what we’ve already done.’ ”

2. If a collaborative agreement isn’t already in place, consider working with other communities to put one in place rather than attempting the performance contracting process on your own.

 “They’re going to find that more communities are in the same boat that they are. And so why not take advantage of doing it collectively?

“I don’t see any downside to doing it because you don’t lose any control. The individual community enters into the agreement, so you don’t lose any control over that. You make that decision, yes or no. Even the firm – while the selection process identified a number one, number two, and number three, the procurement law in Massachusetts allows you to go to number two or three and use them if you cannot make an agreement with number one. So the community still has complete control over which vendor they actually go to and whether they do it or not. They haven’t lost any kind of control over the process.

“But they have the benefit of sharing the cost of the procurement, sharing expertise, sharing experiences, and feeding off of the energy of ‘Well, what do you think of that person?’ ”

3. Find someone to help organize your community around this effort.

“I think that you could ask your staff to do that, but it might be helpful for an entity to come in and do a laundry list and say: ‘These are the things that you need to think about – the buildings, the energy bills, developing an RFP, time frame, financing.’ Someone to just get your thoughts organized around this effort. Once you understand where you want to go as far as the process, then issue the RFP.”

4.       Have a community-based committee evaluate ESCO proposals.

“At the end of the day, the communities will be entering into a contract with the provider. It is imperative that there is buy in and consensus on who that provider should be.  By selecting a committee of community representatives to evaluate proposal you have created a natural way of selecting someone collectively and ensuring buy in.”

5.       Ask each ESCO provider who is shortlisted to do a preliminary audit.

“Our evaluation committee selected an example building and asked each ESCO provider to do their own audit. They presented it. And then the review committee could see how they organized their thoughts around a preliminary audit. It wasn’t an investment-grade audit, clearly, but it was a preliminary audit that could show the review committee how each ESCO approached a project.  It was very useful to have the committee understand how the ESCO would approach an audit.”

North Hampton energy savings effort pushes ahead

By: Shir Haberman

NORTH HAMPTON — The town’s Energy Committee is not resting on its laurels. It is continuing to seek ways to reduce energy costs.

The committee solicited the help of the Boston-based Peregrine Energy Group to both follow up on the recommendations for savings the committee made in 2009, and to come up with suggestions on ways the town can save even more. Peregrine’s report was submitted to the Select Board late last month.

“This memorandum summarizes accomplishments to date under the committee’s efficiency initiatives, and identifies further opportunities to reduce utility use with potential cost and savings implications,” Peregrine employees Kaj Huld and Steven Weisman wrote in an Oct. 19 report to the committee. “We commend the committee for creating a valuable and comprehensive planning document, and also commend the town for moving forward and implementing many committee recommendations.”

Peregrine’s review of the 2009 energy audit prepared by the committee showed that 12 of the 24 recommendations made at that time have been addressed. Four other recommendations were judged to be unnecessary or to offer a poor economic return by the consultants.

The items left to address from the 2009 audit range from something as simple as resetting the thermostat in the computer server room in the town offices to seeking insulation bids for several town buildings. Town Administrator Steve Fournier and Public Works Director John Hubbard have indicated they are actively working on the remaining audit recommendations.

In addition to the review of the 2009 audit, Peregrine came up with 24 new recommendations for efficiencies throughout the town complex on Atlantic Avenue. The consultants recommended that 14 of those items be done immediately.

Those 14 recommendations include such things as going to more energy efficient lighting in the police station, insulating a hot-water pipe in the fire station, installing insulation over the boiler in the library and adding programmable thermostats in the town offices.

“The cost for the recommended subset of measures is around $6,050 and will result in annual savings of $1,430, for a simple payback of just over four years,” the Peregrine report indicated.

The payback period for the other 10 recommendations made by Peregrine would be substantially longer. The costs of those items was estimated at approximately $89,100, with a yearly savings of $2,170, making the payback period about 41 years.

Included in those 10 additional recommendations were $20,000 for insulating the roof of the fire station, $15,000 for insulating the meeting room walls and attic of the old Town Hall, $27,000 for reconfiguring the duct work at the library and $15,000 to replace the fire station boiler.

With town officials working to present a warrant article to voters at the 2012 Town Meeting for funding for a complete renovation of the town complex, many of the more expensive recommendations could be dealt with through that process, Town Administrator Steve Fournier said.

The cost of the consultants’ work was paid for by the state, Huld and Weisman indicated.

“Our work is funded by the New Hampshire Office of Energy and Planning’s Energy Technical Assistance and Planning Program with the goal of supporting the town’s efforts with respect to energy efficiency improvements and capital upgrades,” the Peregrine report stated.

Peregrine Energy Group has been selected to provide web based utility data management services to Bergen County, New Jersey. Peregrine is partnered with GridSmart Energy, a competitive energy procurement service provider to deliver a joint suite of services that includes both energy information management and reporting and energy procurement.

Using Peregrine Focus, Peregrine’s web-based energy information management and reporting tool, Peregrine will centralize Bergen County’s energy information, organize it, and transform it from spreadsheets and paper-based records into graphical, visually appealing reports that are easy to understand and use.

Interactive reports from Peregrine Focus developed to monitor energy use and costs over time will serve as key tools to help the county to achieve its goals of understanding its energy picture, managing energy costs down, and effectively projecting those costs for budgeting.

Peregrine Focus is a web-based energy information management and reporting platform developed by Peregrine Energy Group that is already used to centralize and track energy consumption and emissions for public buildings throughout New England. Accessible from anywhere through a browser, Peregrine Focus offers interactive reports and dashboards designed by energy efficiency experts that make it easy to monitor and compare energy performance and the impact of energy efficiency measures across departments, buildings, units, programs, or any other organizational structure. Users can filter and drill down into reports on the fly to see as much or as little data as they need, then easily download and share those reports and the data behind them.

About Peregrine Energy Group

Peregrine Energy Group brings extensive expertise in the creation of energy information databases, in the collection and analysis of energy data, and in the development of straightforward reports that make complex energy information easy to understand and use. Founded in 1992 and based in Boston, Massachusetts, we offer a deep knowledge of energy efficiency and renewable energy, a thorough understanding of energy programs and policies, and a passion for making energy information easy to understand, use, and share with others. Our clients are public and private organizations with large building portfolios and complicated energy information. Our team draws on decades of experience from across the energy industry in policy development, program planning, building analysis, energy efficiency, and renewables. We meet complicated energy challenges with solutions that are grounded in data and deliver results that can be measured.

Project will enable 10 states to more effectively evaluate energy efficiency investments

Boston, MA. Peregrine Energy Group has been selected by the Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships (NEEP) to develop a system – known as the REED – for 10 eastern seaboard states from the New England, New York, and mid-Atlantic areas to use for tracking and reporting on the impacts of energy efficiency investments. Central to the system will be interactive, easy-to-read reports from Peregrine Focus, Peregrine’s web-based energy data analysis and reporting tool. Featuring easy-to-read graphics and interactive, user-friendly filtering and drill-down capabilities, these reports will play a key role in delivering on the goal of enabling straightforward energy and environmental analysis and planning.

Funded in part by the federal Department of Energy, the REED will bring to life the Common Statewide Energy Efficiency and Reporting Guidelines developed by NEEP. These guidelines recommend a set of reporting templates that will enable clear reporting of state-level energy savings (both energy and demand), program funding, program expenditures, program costs, avoided emissions, and job impacts.

“The database and associated reports will enable the states to report the results of their energy efficiency programs  in a way that supports comparison, aggregation, and analysis,” explained Peregrine CEO and founder Paul Gromer. Together, the Guidelines and REED will help states to demonstrate the effectiveness of their energy efficiency initiatives.”

He argues that the development of district heating systems and combined heat and power (CHP) plants would increase if there were detailed data available to help pinpoint the best locations to install decentralized heat producers. To help make the case, he points to the success of the London Heat Map that Arup has developed as part of the city’s Decentralised Energy Master Planning program. He claims that the mapping efforts have helped lead to the development of numerous smaller projects including one that would reach 120,000 homes, businesses and public buildings.

A look at the London Heat Map web site does provide some stunning visuals—reminiscent of the maps I shared here in last month—and an interactive GIS map to explore the data.

From http://www.londonheatmap.org.uk/Content/HeatMap.aspx

Both Ball’s article and the London Heat Map’s official site are vague on the specifics about where the data came from to produce these maps. Despite that, I do believe strongly with his assertion that maps using real-world data are far more useful than those coming from benchmarked data—as is the case for most national maps currently found in UK studies.

That’s exactly what we’ve been attempting to do with analysis of real-world energy use data in both Cambridge and Boston. The city of Boston in particular has been on the forefront, using GIS technology to assist in the development of solar power within the city. Anyone can log in and see what kind of solar potential their roof has. With their Renew Boston program, there is recognition that looking at energy data of only one source – or even many – may not be enough. Renew Boston is looking forward to mapping real energy consumption data for electric and gas. They plan to take it one step further by mapping the consumption data to feedback from vendors who provide energy audits and efficiency retrofit services. This will allow services to be targeted, delivered, and tracked by geographic location.

Combining the geographic planning and analysis tools of GIS software with energy information is a new and exciting development. It’s great to see major cities like Boston and London running with it.

@ElisaWood: A creative, down-to-earth, and always engaging look at energy
@CleanerUSA: Always finds the most fascinating energy news items
@inhabitat: Inspiring designs with a good bit of energy efficiency thrown in

A few years ago, I remember going to see an exhibit at the Boston Public Library that showcased a number of aerial maps of the city and its surroundings. As an urban planning student, I was fascinated by the changes one could see in the landscape over time. Cartographers were fortunate enough to witness these changes each time they set out to make a new map. With today’s technology, comparing maps of time periods is much easier. Check out the David Rumsey Map Collection to see what I mean.

Yet, we can now also use maps show a lot more data besides location and size of cities, streets, and their buildings. Energy use data is often tracked at the building level or sub-building levels making it a prime candidate for mapping.

My early imagination of energy use mapping had me spray-painting over Google Earth images of my parents’ neighborhood, arbitrarily coloring in homes red, orange, yellow, and green in a mock display of who was using how much energy relative to their neighbors.

Those initial sketches would have seen a static image manipulated after an arbitrary determination was made about which buildings were “good” performers and which performed “poorly.” Over the past few years I’ve had the opportunity to experiment with using GIS software as a platform for creating these visual displays with live input directly from the data used in the analysis.

Here is one example. Below, you see an energy “heat map” made using a sample set of utility data mapped to areas of a neighborhood. The term “heat map” may be a bit misleading in this case, because this sample analysis was done using both electricity and natural gas consumption data over a fixed period of time. After calculating an energy use intensity for each building with square footage data obtained from the city assessor’s office with utility bill information and plotting it in ESRI’s ArcGIS, we are able to map out which parts of the neighborhood have the highest density of high energy use per square foot, as seen in the darker red patches over the neighborhood. This allows us to identify the areas that may have the greatest potential for energy efficiency improvements, without identifying the specific use or characteristics of any specific home-owner or business.

Energy heat map (This image first appeared in a presentation given at AESP's Spring Conference & Expo on May 4, 2010.)

Similar to the discussion above about landscapes, energy use data is constantly changing. Although each of these maps only shows a snapshot in time, energy use data are collected and stamped according to time. This allows us to create unique visuals that track changes in energy consumption patterns and to measure progress toward meeting energy efficiency goals.

The map below is a snapshot from a series of maps that is designed to show energy use intensity for a given month compared to the same month in the previous year. Let’s say that every resident in the neighborhood shown below decided to set a community goal for saving energy. Using the same sample data set as above, these maps can easily show participants where the savings are coming from (the darker green areas), and where there is more work to be done (the places in the neighborhood highlighted in red).

Energy use intensity over time (This image first appeared in a presentation given at AESP's Spring Conference & Expo on May 4, 2010.)

We’ve come a long way since my first mockup. But one issue that is still up for debate and should be – is how to we display this data and protect the privacy of personal information such as energy use and efficiency of one’s building.

Is it your business to know what your neighbors are using? Should businesses hesitate to let their competitors know their energy spending habits?

The maps above are not the only answer. In some places, like Gainesville, FL, you can see everybody’s energy use pinpointed on a Google Maps interface. Others may try to aggregate data at the census block level or higher to mask personal data.

We continue to think about these issues and work on new ways to make these analyses useful. I hope to have more of these maps to show you in the coming months.