AVON CLEAN ENERGY COMMISSION
SELECTMEN’S CHAMBER BLDG. #1 TOWN HALL
MINUTES
MARCH 7, 2012
I. CALL MEETING TO ORDER
The meeting was called to order at 7:02 PM by Acting Chairman Bernard Zahren in the Selectmen’s Chamber, Building 1 Town Hall. Members present: Acting Chairman Bernard Zahren, Martin Kaplan, Brian Glenn, Mitch Kennedy and Lisa Levin. Members absent: none. Advisory members present: Giorgina Paiella and Diane Zhao. Advisory member absent: Jonathan Craig. Also in attendance were staff members Steve Bartha, Assistant Town Manager, and Ann Dearstyne, Town Clerk.
II. APPROVAL OF THE PRECEDING MEETING MINUTES – February 1st
Mr. Zahren noted that there were two empty seats on the Commission and through discussion with the Republican Town Chairman two potential members were to be presented to the Town Council. He added that only one was presented at the meeting – Richard Kretz. Ms. Dearstyne said the second nominee will be presented at the next Town Council meeting. Mr. Zahren was pleased to note that five members were present at tonight’s meeting.
Mr. Zahren questioned Mr. Bartha regarding the reappointment of the commission. He asked that if the Town Council hadn’t adopted the 30% by 2015 then the commission wouldn’t have been reappointed. Mr. Bartha said that technically that was yes. Ms. Dearstyne provided a handout showing the commission’s charge and recharge: 1) the goal of 30% by 2015, 2) the development of an Energy Plan for the Town and BOE, and 3) to continue to provide periodic reviews and reports upon request. Mr. Bartha reminded that the commission is an ad hoc commission.
VOTE: Mr. Kaplan motioned, Dr. Kennedy seconded and all agreed to accept the February 1, 2012 minutes as presented. None opposed or abstained.
III. COMMUNICATIONS FROM THE AUDIENCE
None.
IV. COMMUNICATIONS FROM STUDENT ADVISORS
Ms. Paiella reported that the meeting with the Energy Guy went well saying that he gave them lots of facts around energy saved. She noted that they are meeting this Friday in order to develop advertisements that go along with Mr. Gaski’s recommendations and achievements. Ms. Levin questioned the validity of the 27% number that Mr. Gaski had given for achieved energy savings for the schools at the last meeting. Dr. Kennedy suggested that the agreement the BOE was using was a “projected energy savings if” type. He explained that the savings are based on projected energy use against what has been used. The 27% savings is compared to a projected amount and, looking at the numbers of year over year, that amount was not achieved. Mr. Zahren agreed that there was no way they had achieved savings of over
$200,000 since June and that it was one of a performance based contract where the company would get more based on the savings the schools achieved. Mr. Zahren added that if the schools could achieve these kinds of savings then indeed we could meet the goals by 2015.
Ms. Zhao said they were going to create posters to put around the school to show what the energy club has done and what the Energy Guy has been able to save, in order to raise awareness. Mr. Zahren reminded that two more people would have to be found at the school to replace the student advisors who’d be leaving for college. Mr. Zahren commended and thanked them for their efforts and contributions to the commission. Ms. Paiella agreed that the ultimate goal along with the commission would be to have the town of Avon be the greenest in the State.
V. OLD BUSINESS: a. Sub-committee report from 2/27/12 meeting, b. Continue on draft energy plan, c. Feasibility Report for the Solar PV – Middle School
Ms. Levin apologized to Mr. Zahren for diverting from his directive instead taking matters into their own hands to craft changes. She suggested to the sub-committee to first make the document more readable and increase the educational aspect because it will be becoming a public document. Dr. Kennedy agreed that readability was important in order to engage people to take the document seriously. He’d like to add the carbon footprint information from Mr. Zahren. Ms. Levin would like to let people know where we’ve been and where we’re going. She reminded that we need to add page numbers and a table of contents. She suggested breaking up the executive summary with some visuals like pie charts and other graphics. Ms. Levin would also like to see a timeline added as it’s an easy way to communicate the
message of where the Commission started and what’s been achieved, adding markers to points in time. She’d like the timeline added after the executive summary. Mr. Bartha questioned the placement of Mr. Zahren’s letter and suggested it come ahead of the executive summary. Mr. Zahren said his letter was an introductory cover memo to the recipients of the plan. Mr. Bartha interjected that we had surpassed the original budget with Peregrine for the plan potentially compromising balances earmarked for retro-commissioning analysis. He continued that in talking with Mr. Weisman that he had no problem doing what he was doing in reformatting changes but that it’d be more beneficial for everyone that he meet with the sub-committee. Mr. Zahren offered to create graphics. Mr. Zahren agreed that we didn’t want to spend the rest of the money wordsmithing to death. Mr. Bartha offered to speak with Mr. Weisman to arrange a meeting with the sub-committee to finish the
plan. Mr. Bartha added that the commission decides how the remaining dollars are spent.
Mr. Zahren questioned the timing of presenting the plan to the Town Council and BOE. Mr. Bartha said Mr. Weisman and Mr. Zahren would take the lead on the presentation. Ms. Dearstyne said the Town Council doesn’t have as much work to do on the budget until it goes to referendum other than a town meeting. Mr. Bartha suggested getting the plan done even if it couldn’t be presented due to problems with the budget. Ms. Levin asked if there was anything else that the Town Council needed other than to vote on the plan and if there’d be public input. Mr. Bartha said there was nothing in the plan that is being mandated or asking for committed resources. Ms. Levin summarized that the plan is guidance, an advisory one. Mr. Bartha referred to the charge which is to make recommendations to the Town Council. Mr.
Zahren was under the impression from the last meeting that we all agreed that at least the school was going to put out a bid to try to put solar PV on the Middle School if not others. He referred to Dr. Kennedy providing the stats necessary to install the panels. Mr. Zahren cautioned that we should be acting soon for fear of missing incentives. Dr. Kennedy concurred. Mr. Bartha replied that he had no authority today to put out an RFP for panels and agreed that he felt their frustration too.
Mr. Kaplan questioned if we’ve abandoned the free panel program for the schools. Mr. Zahren answered that we pretty much had given up after efforts to sign-up had failed given the commission’s efforts, booths at Avon Day and contacts with the Superintendent of Schools to mobilize the PTO for assistance. He added that there was no active group out there urging people to sign up. Mr. Glenn reminded that the town of Cornwall was successful because of one person championing the whole town to sign up. Mr. Zahren added that the differential to sign up for savings from CL & P and paying more for green energy is not there anymore.
Mr. Zahren asked Dr. Kennedy to discuss his meeting with Mr. Gaski. Dr. Kennedy relayed that Mr. Gaski said there’d be no way that the town would buy panels outright as a budgetary item, which would leave two other options. One option is issuing a bond which would be time consuming and the other is to buy power that comes off of a system – having panels on the roof but not owning them and buying them when the agreement was up, usually 15 years – a solar lease. Mr. Zahren noted that solar panels are probably at their lowest given the coming new anti-dumping surtaxes. Based on all this, Mr. Zahren feels the best way is to put out a bid to get the best solar lease proposal.
Mr. Kaplan questioned why the town is not looking into performance contracts given the high interest by other towns. Mr. Zahren summed that anything acted on in the plan will take capital from somewhere. Dr. Kennedy said that performance contracts appeal to towns that are strapped for money looking to save money through energy savings. He cautioned too that it’s difficult to verify that you’re getting the savings that are claimed. Mr. Bartha reiterated Mr. Weisman’s sentiments that some towns are better candidates for performance contracts than others depending if they’ve kept up with maintenance upgrades to more energy efficient replacements or had a long way to go for greater energy efficiency. Avon has done a good job in taking care of its capital infrastructure. Mr. Glenn questioned what the
town of West Hartford does. Mr. Zahren replied that they have bonded and they’ve also gotten the Town Council to allocate energy savings to further find energy savings.
Mr. Bartha noted that advisory boards traditionally do not tell the town what to spend. Costs and more detail would be needed to be considered a viable project to present to the Town Council and BOE. Mr. Bartha and Mr. Glenn offered to look into protocol. Mr. Zahren offered that Dr. Kennedy and Mr. Gaski have created a productive template for the RFP and cautioned that we could be missing a good window. Mr. Zahren also suggested getting several contractors to come in and talk about what they offer which shouldn’t be at any cost to the town.
Ms. Levin continued the sub-committee report. She referred to the Q & A section needing more substantive wording. She’d be happy to look at it again once Mr. Weisman cleaned it up some more. Dr. Kennedy questioned if converting energy numbers into carbon would be something that Mr. Weisman would take care of. He cautioned too that to have credibility you’d have to use international standards for carbon foot printing. Ms. Levin reminded to include a glossary. She suggested using a text box in lieu of a traditional glossary so that terms could be defined as they appeared in the plan. Some terms she’d like to contain in a text box and bolded are energy use index, BTU, carbon footprint, renewable clean energy (solar, wind, hydroelectric, geothermal), energy conservation measures, EUI, operation and
maintenance, retro-commissioning, end of life equipment, utility incentive available, life cycle, performance backed contracting and power purchase agreement.
VI. NEW BUSINESS
VII. COMMUNICATIONS FROM THE COMMISSION
Mr. Zahren discussed the state’s definition of who’s a utility and who’s not which favors the utility who’d like to stay a monopoly. He said some towns have embarked on an initiative where they could produce their own power in a micro grid, for example, through a co-gen plant. He referred to the newly planned development behind the town hall as being a good candidate for a small plant. Mr. Bartha said Mr. Kushner is the main contact for information on the development. Mr. Kaplan cautioned that to do this generation of power you could not cross any CL & P line and there were many stipulations with this approach. Dr. Kennedy added that excess power could be sold back to the utility or it could be set up as an island which would run unaffected by outages. He continued that there are incentives
available through federal tax credit or accelerated depreciation as well as less cost/kW for power generated. Ms. Levin asked how they’re typically financed. Dr. Kennedy said the ones he’s been involved with are privately funded. Mr. Zahren would like to discuss it with Mr. Kushner before it’d be considered to be put into the plan.
Mr. Kaplan questioned if education on the indication side was strictly for the schools or the community. Ms. Levin said the community and that it was the first action item. She added that one of the action items was a town wide energy education with a speaker series or a quarterly meeting offering different topics.
Mr. Zahren said there’d be another town consortium (CT Energy & Sustainability Forum) to be held in Wethersfield Saturday, March 24th, 9:00 AM to 2:00 PM. He said it’s a good opportunity to meet with other towns to exchange ideas about what we’re doing and what they’re doing. Sign up is electronic at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/MarchSustainabilityForum
Mr. Zahren would like PACE mentioned in the energy plan. It stands for Property Assessed Clean Energy. He explained that you can put solar panels on your roof which would be assessed by the town as an additional tax. The town collects from everyone who wants the panels which then get paid off through a bond over a period of 20 years. Dr. Kennedy explained too that the homeowner could move without having to pay the bond which would continue through to the next owner.
Mr. Bartha reported that Mr. Weisman had received the necessary information he needed from the engineering department regarding the sewers. Mr. Bartha will also be tentatively attending an event April 3rd sponsored by CCM in partnership with CEFIA and CEEF held in Rentschler Field called Leading By Example New Energy Opportunities for Municipalities. March 14th the town will be opening bids for the LED lighting gotten through the Quick Spend Grant for $36,545.00. $32,000 will go to material with the balance going to Public Works for the installation. Mr. Zahren mentioned that it’d be a good idea to publicize these projects through the local media.
VIII. DO ANY BUSINESS TO COME BEFORE THIS MEETING
IX. ADJOURN
VOTE: Ms. Levin motioned, Mr. Glenn seconded and all agreed to adjourn the meeting at 8:33 PM. None opposed.
Respectfully submitted:
Acting Chairman Bernard Zahren
Attest: Susan Gatcomb, Clerk
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