Clean Energy Resource Teams

On August 19th the Southeast Clean Energy Resource Team toured two green landmarks in the Twin Cities: The Green Institute’s Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center Building in Minneapolis and District Energy in St. Paul. Let me take a few moments to share with you what we learned!

Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center

 
From 1:30-2:30pm our group toured The Green Institute’s Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center. The Phillips Eco-Enterprise Center (PEEC) is The Green Institute’s flagship and a national model of comprehensive sustainable design. The building was a pilot for and helped inform the creation of the United States Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (USGBC’s LEED), which has in the last ten years risen within the green building movement as the preeminent national green building standard.

In April 2008, the Minnesota Clean Energy Resource Teams (CERTs) received over 90 submissions for this year’s Request for Proposals to fund energy efficiency and renewable energy projects. This represents nearly a twofold increase in the amount of proposals submitted for spring of 2008, and attests to the tremendous wealth of clean energy projects happening in communities across the state.

Each of the six greater Minnesota steering committees (NE, NW, Central, WC, SW, SE) reviewed the proposals submitted in their region, and through a rigorous process selected 37 projects that highlight a variety of renewable energy and energy efficiency technologies. CERTs staff wish to commend our steering committee members for all the hard work and many hours of volunteer time they put into this effort.

On Monday, June 16, 2008 from 1-3pm The Minnesota Department of Commerce gave a web seminar on the Phase 1 results of their Minnesota Dispersed Renewable Generation (DRG) Study. The purpose of the webinar was to inform the public of the first phase results, key findings, and conclusions. The study team gave a PowerPoint presentation summarizing the DRG Phase I report to the MN Public Utilities Commission.

This blog post should allow you to:
1. Understand Dispersed Generation
2. Watch and listen to the DG webinar presentation
3. Get a summary of important slides
4. Learn how to get more info and provide comments on the Study

CREBs in Brief

 
The Clean Renewable Energy Bond (CREB) program is administered by the Internal Revenue Service and provides bond authorization for public entities on a competitive basis for renewable electricity projects. The benefit of the CREB program is that public entities receive the bonds at “zero” percent interest. The revenue or cost savings from the renewable electricity systems are utilized to pay off the bonds.

The program was initially authorized via the Energy Policy Act of 2005 and designed as an alternative to the Production Tax Credit (PTC)—which can be utilized by private renewable energy developers and investor-owned utilities—to be used by cooperative electric and public power utilities. Beyond these utilities other eligible entities include schools, local governments, tribal governments. The program has provided two rounds of bonding authorization—610 projects during the first round and 312 projects in the second round.

Dan Thiede live-blogs this session at the Minnesota Green Communities third annual statewide GREEN BY DESIGN Conference

R.T. Rybak highlights Minneapolis and Minnesota steps toward green development, and gets us all fired up, Ellen Anderson discusses legislative intiatives and the merging of economic and social justice issues with energy issues, and Van Jones talks about building a green economy for all.

Dan Thiede live-blogs this session at the Minnesota Green Communities third annual statewide GREEN BY DESIGN Conference. View all conference presentations here.

Facilitator: Dane Smith, Growth & Justice, former Star Tribune writer
Panelists: Ellen Anderson, Senator, State of Minnesota | Edward A. Garvey, MN Office of Energy Security, Department of Commerce | Barb Thoman, Transit for Livable Communities

The panel will review the recommendations of the Minnesota Climate Change Advisory Group, provide updates on policy actions responding to those recommendations, and discuss their implementation. There will be plenty of time for discussion!

 
The Metro CERTs Network Kick-off on April 15th was attended by over 200 people, from elected officials to community members—and everyone in between! It was held at the Landmark Center in downtown St. Paul, where the main room was buzzing with conversation.

There was good energy, and many great connections made. “It was a very well done get together and I think very beneficial to everyone. You did a great job,” said Ruth Keely. Brian Flanagan felt much the same way: “Great venue last night. Good group of people—excellent for networking. The Food was outstanding; I hope you have more get togethers!” We even dubbed the King and Queen of networking, Beth Bennett and John Dunlop.