07.17.06

EPA Releases Top 10 List of Retail Green Power Partners

Posted in Uncategorized at 9:28 am by member

The EPA has released an update to its national Top 10 Retail Partners list, which highlights the largest national purchases of renewable energy by retail Partner organizations of the Green Power Partnership. The list reflects purchase information through June 26, 2006.

Whole Foods Market topped the list, followed by Starbucks. In the top five were Safeway Inc., FedEx Kinko’s and Staples. Recreational Equipment, Inc. (REI) made its first appearance on the list, coming in at No.10.

Combined, the green power purchases of the Top 10 Retail Partners amount to nearly 900 million kilowatt-hours (kWh) of green power annually, an increase of about six percent since the last Top 10 Retail list was released in April 2006.

EPA updates its Top Partner lists of green power purchasers quarterly. The next scheduled update is set for October 2006 and will reflect information received as of September 21, 2006.

For more information on EPA’s Green Power Partnership, visit http://www.epa.gov/greenpower.

For more information on EPA’s Top 10 List of Retail Partners, visit http://www.epa.gov/greenpower/partners/top10retail.htm.

Green Power Partnership U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Web site: http://www.epa.gov/greenpower

Mike Stosser

Meeting Minutes - June 28, 2006

Posted in Committee Business at 9:36 am by member

Michael Stosser, new Chair of the Committee, led the call. Introductions by Mike, Vice-Chairs Monica Schwebs and Bill Westerfield, and Lynn Fountain.

Edna Sussman, Chair of the ABA Renewables Committee, spoke on the ABA Renewables Committee’s brown bag luncheons. Edna encouraged our committee to follow their practice of using host locations and call-in service. Edna estimated that her committee has 250 – 600 attendees per call, half of which are probably government officials. For more information go to Renewableenergyinfo.com. Gearold Knowles complimented Edna on the ABA practice of making materials available in advance of teleconferences. Edna recommended that our Committee teleconference speakers prepare power point presentations and a reading list for each program.

Mike Zimmer suggested that our Committee programs avoid overlapping with the ABA Renewables Committee. He recommended obtaining speakers from FERC, Congress and other public agencies. Monica then recommended inviting new FERC Commissioner Wellinghoff, on the topics of transmission and distributed generation. Jeff Dennis of FERC offered to help get Commissioner Wellinghoff. Jeff, Monica and Gearold will spearhead the effort to organize that program.

Lynn informed the Committee about our new weblog or blog. She followed-up our conference call by emailing members a link to the new website, as well as the necessary ID and password to post messages. No log-in is needed to read postings. Members will have access to the web-site. The Committee is seeking postings, such as papers, news and links to valuable websites. Mike pointed out that we want to hear what people are working on. It would also be a way to suggest speakers and Energy Law Journal articles. Lynn will manage the blog.

Mike said that it’s important for our Committee to increase its visibility. He suggested a report in the Energy Bar Journal and a panel at the next EBA meeting. He asked for a concept or topic for that panel. Todd Glass observed that venture capitalists are “throwing money” at renewable energy, and that this is a good time to talk about financing. Mike agreed. He suggested that a discussion of financing should focus on what to do to get money; how to package new projects; not just how to get public incentives but how to obtain private financing. He added that there continues to be serious concerns about technical and environmental issues concerning renewables.

Bob Webb spoke about biofuels and biodiesel. He promised to give us the latest information from Texas via the blog. Mike Schnell talked about financing of biofuels. Don McCauley said he puts together an annual report to the ABA and offered to do one for our Committee. The ABA did its last brown bag teleconference on biofuels in September 2005. Roger Feldman is heading the ABA Committee on Renewable Finance. Todd will spearhead an effort to organize a biofuels brownbag program for the Committee.

Gunnar Birgisson is chair of the EBA committee on environment. Mike asked that we try to work with him on issues such as climate change and biofuels.

Mike raised the matter of frequency of Committee calls. Carolyn said she would like to have us meet monthly. Bill agreed that we should start with monthly calls in order to create some momentum. Mike said he would try to do monthly calls. He will also update the Committee email list. Mike also said that we should try to hold brownbag teleconferences quarterly.

Minutes by Bill Westerfield

07.27.06

Michigan’s 21st Century Energy Plan (Work in Progress)

Posted in Uncategorized at 3:31 pm by member

The Governor of Michigan, Jennifer Granholm, directed the chair of the Michigan PSC, Peter Lark, to submit an energy plan for the 21st Century for safe, clean, affordable and reliable power; she also asked that it include a renewable portfolio standard proposal. The staff of the PSC have been working on the task since. (The plan will address electricity only; it does not address natural gas or transportation fuels.)

You can look at the work of the entire project here:
http://www.dleg.state.mi.us/mpsc/electric/capacity/energyplan/

And you can look at the work of the renewables team here: http://www.dleg.state.mi.us/mpsc/electric/capacity/energyplan/renewables/renewables.htm

The plan is a work in progress now, and it is due this December.

For those wishing to support renewables

Posted in Uncategorized at 3:37 pm by member

One efficient way to support renewables if you are not able to source them directly is to buy renewable energy credits that go to supporting renewable projects.

At http://www.carbonfund.org/site/ I used a calculator to calculate my family’s total CO2 footprint (from driving, home heating and lighting, and from flying) and found that I could buy sufficient RECs to neutralize that amount of CO2 for around $13 per month–so I set up an automatic monthly payment for $15 a month ($180/yr) and now don’t feel so bad about running the air conditioner when it’s hot and sticky here in the Midwest.

Oh, and it’s fully tax-deductible, so it’s costing me not much more than I was previously paying to my local municipal electric company to help them buy 250 kWh of electricity generated from landfill gas.

Investment in Biodiesel Company

Posted in Uncategorized, Member Projects at 4:36 pm by member

Ardour Capital Investments recently worked with Nova Energy Holding, Inc. to complete the final round of private placement of securities consisting of its common stock and warrants to purchase common stock. The net proceeds from the private placement totaled approximately $18.8 million. Nova intends to use these funds as working capital and for general corporate purposes in the pursuit of its business strategy to build and operate two to four biodiesel refineries with a production capacity of between 120 to 240 million gallons of biodiesel fuel per year. You can read more about Nova by accessing its website: http://www.novaenergyholding.com/

Mike Stosser