Board OKs Madison New Gym, HS Renovations; Angles for Green Vote

The Madison Central School Board green-lighted (green-lit?) the new gym and high school renovations project at its regular meeting last night. The Madison Daily Leader also continued its campaign of spin and obfuscation, referring solely to "renovations" and "new space" and not once mentioning the biggest single item in the $16M package, the new gym.

The school board is clearly alarmed by the bad press here in the blogosphere. In an effort to stanch opposition and bring Madison's busiest blog on board with the project, architect Jeff Nelson is throwing an obvious bone to the green commentariat:

Jeff Nelson, Baldridge and Nelson president, told the board members that his firm could start working on a "full-blown package." He said that the package would include a complete floor plan and an energy study that would consider utility cost savings and possible renewable energy use, such as solar and wind generation [Chuck Clement, "Madison School Board Says Yes to Renovations," Madison Daily Leader, 2010.10.11].

Oh! Solar panels! Wind turbines! Well, I'm totally on board now. Forget I said anything bad about building a luxury gym or trying to hide this unnecessary project behind educational necessities. Slap a solar panel on top, and I'm all for it, right?

Actually, I wold be quite pleased to see our high school follow the City of Colton's lead and move toward energy self-sufficiency. But watch: someone will discover that the low thrum of the wind turbines would distract our Bulldog free-throw shooters, and then the turbines are out.

Colton Uses Stimulus to Build Energy Independence

Visitors survey the renewable energy and energy efficiency upgrades to the Colton City East Shop.

It's the patriotic thing to do!

Twelve solar panels. Two wind turbines. It's not Sarnia or Buffalo Ridge. But those twelve panels and two turbines are enough to make Colton, South Dakota, the first energy-independent municipality in our fair state.

Mayor Erik Miller and Colton city staff hosted a ribbon-cutting yesterday afternoon to officially kick off their Energy Independent Community Initiative. Mayor Miller explained to a packed meeting room in the Taopi Hall that Colton has used American Recovery and Reinvestment Act dollars (you know, that nasty, useless stimulus money) to install enough solar and wind power production capacity to run city hall and the east and west city shops without grid power. Colton also used the money to weatherize the buildings, with new doors, windows, and insulation. Mayor Miller says their EIC Initiative has allowed the city to double its working shop space with no increase—and possibly a decrease—in energy cost.

Ken Hitzeman cuts the ceremonial ribbon for Colton's Energy-Independent Community Initiative.

Mayor Miller did not take credit for this forward-looking energy project. The "spark" behind the whole project is local resident Ken Hitzeman. The mayor said Hitzeman, a local renewable energy expert, brought up the idea of putting Colton on the map with wind turbines—"whirlybirds"—and other energy-producing and energy-saving projects. Hitzeman's passion for the project, said Miller, came from a simple commitment to the idea of energy self-sufficiency. Hitzeman is driven by the dread of seeing American energy dollars go overseas and buy even one bullet that might kill one American soldier. For his patriotic commitment to making energy here in small-town South Dakota, Mayor Miller made Hitzeman blush, just a little, by declaring yesterday "Ken Hitzeman Day" in Colton.

Eletrical equipment turning wind and solar power into usable juice in the Colton City East Shop:

1. wind-solar hybrid converter
2. excess power sink
3. inverter
4. smart meter
5. battery pack
   

City officials took time to show us the nuts and bolts at the "East Shop" next to the Taopi Hall. The small wind turbine sits atop an old windmill tower which used to support a town emergency. How's that for recycling? (A city employee also mentioned his dad once towed that tower, upright, a couple blocks across town to its current location.) Three solar panels lie on the south side of the roof. Inside, a converter combines the wind and solar power for use. Excess power is stored in four batteries. The battery pack in the East Shop can hold two hours of power. They should last fifteen years, with a replacement cost of about $2000.

To extend the life of the batteries, a controller shuts off the wind turbine when the batteries are fully charged and doesn't switch it back on unless the batteries have been drained to 50%. The controller also shuts off the turbine if the wind exceeds 65 miles per hour. When the batteries run out, power switches automatically to the grid with just the barest flicker of the lights.

East Shop smart meter shows zero power input from the grid. That's a zero we like!

A smart meter shows exactly how much power the system is producing and how much additional power the system is drawing from Sioux Valley Electric. Yesterday's grid power intake reading, with the wind turbine quiet and only the three solar panels juicing the shop: 0.0 kW. Ah, self-reliance....

Colton's EIC Initiative is bigger than just energy self-sufficiency for three city buildings. Ken Hitzeman is helping organize a community task force to promote conservation and recycling in Colton. That citizen group will also look for ways to promote energy self-sufficiency for Colton businesses and residents. The EIC Task Force will storm up some ideas at its first organizational meeting on October 19 (7 p.m., Daybreak Express in Colton). They will also start a dialogue about local energy independence on a new Facebook page, which they plan to launch in the coming weeks.

Mayor Miller may be new to Facebook—he said he just learned it for this project, and there were plenty of chuckles from city employees when the mayor asked at the press conference if the shop staff had all updated their Facebook status. But he already gets that the Web and blogs can support real conversation and exchange of ideas both within a community and with communities around the state.

State Senator Scott Heidepriem congratualtes Colton on its pioneering energy-independence initiative

And Colton's EIC Initiative will generate lots of conversation. Gubernatorial candidate and fellow Minnehaha County resident Scott Heidepriem was among the dignitaries who stopped by to congratulate Colton on the EIC Initiative. He noted that Colton will now face the challenge of being a pioneer in energy independence. Pioneers charge forward and solve problems, and then, said Heidepriem, they have to field all the calls and questions from other communities who will want to follow their lead.

Colton's EIC Initiative is a truly visionary, groundbreaking project. Colton's green innovation isn't just about saving the planet (though they're helping!). Colton is showing communities much bigger than itself that we can build the infrastructure now to produce our own power and build energy security at home.

West Shop solar panels and wind turbine

City Hall solar panels

East Shop solar panels and wind turbine

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Update 10:40 CDT: See more coverage of Colton's push for energy independence on KDLT.

Colton Aims for Energy Independence. Colton!

You can take the Kristi Noem position and contend the stimulus has failed. Perhaps Noem would like to double down and say the stimulus has driven folks crazy.

Exhibit A: Colton, South Dakota, which is announcing its plan to become the first energy-independent city in South Dakota:

The City of Colton has broken ground on it's Energy Independent Community (EIC) Initiative with the start of project construction at all city facilities. Recovery Act funding through the U.S. Department of Energy and S.D. Department of Energy will allow Colton to become the first city within the State of South Dakota to subsidize and offset electricity consumption of all city facilities by the use of small wind and solar hybrid system technology! In addition to producing a majority of the electrical energy needed to power city operations through renewable energy, grant funds will also be utilized to increase the energy efficiency at city facilities with improved insulation, upgraded doors and windows, radiant heat sources, upgraded electrical services and improved efficiency lighting. The project will drastically improve the viability and energy efficiency of city facilities, and effectively double city shop square footage without increasing and possibly even reducing current energy demands of city operations [City of Colton, 2010].

A whole city producing as much power as it uses from wind and solar. Crazy, right?

Wrong. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act wasn't just about keeping and creating jobs. It was about inspiring long-term investment in really good ideas, like building renewable energy infrastructure and making improvements that allow us to produce more of our own energy and use it more efficiently.

Colton is thinking big. They're hosting a ribbon-cutting to showcase their big-thinking initiative at the Taopi Hall in Colton on September 28 at 3 p.m. Perhaps candidate Noem will come to Colton to learn what the stimulus is really doing for her fellow South Dakotans.

Green Notes: Bikes, Solar, Good Sense Challenged

Buried in browser tabs! Time to clear the queue!

Colorado is seeing a weird outbreak of velophobia. Some folks have a Sibby-Ellis-tinged idea that promoting Denver as a bicycle city is part of the United Nations' sinister agenda to enslave us all. The tiny casino town of Black Hawk, Colorado has banned bicycles: a new Colorado law requires motorists to give bicycles at least three feet when passing, and Black Hawk reasons that complying with that law would be just too hard for the big tour buses bringing gamblers to town. Riding your bike through town now gets you a $68 fine (to make up for cyclists not spending as much on booze, I guess).

Green power is ugly. Or so goes the thinking, apparently, in Hanover Township, Northampton County, Pennsylvania. Township supervisors there have imposed restrictions on solar panels: tucking panels away beside or behind the house is fine, but if you happen to have a south-facing abode and want to place your panel out front where it will do the most good, you need to get a conditional permit, which will take $800, two months, and all sorts of paperwork. Says a state township association official, "A lot of people have a problem with placing solar panels on the front of their homes for the simple reason...solar panels are distracting and take away from the value of [their] house.... Elected officials are hearing that and they're taking that into consideration." Once again, obsession with appearance trumps environmental sense and property rights.

Solar power is making progress in California. Regulators there have approved the first solar thermal plant in the U.S. in two decades. Ah, good old American innovation... maybe we'll catch up with Portugal after all.

But not if boneheads like Don Kopp stay in office. One of South Dakota's most embarassing legislators provides a teabaggers' splinter group in Rapid City with a slideshow assortment of decontextualized quotes—prooftexting at its finest (and a popular pastime among the non-thinkers in the Tea "Party"). The slides flog the U.N.-evil meme and insisting environmentalists are out to lynch America (yes, slide #10 includes a noose). I'm sure Kopp et al. consider this Kansas City artist's work on sustainable buildings an effort to destroy America, too.
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But think positive: Lester R. Brown sees renewable energy booming worldwide and thinks we can "replace all coal- and oil-fired electricity generation with renewable sources." There is life after oil and coal, people. The sooner we get serious about making it happen, the easier it will be... unless of course you think living like Mad Max would be cool.

Solar Cheaper than Nuclear; Ethanol Needs No Subsidy

A couple of energy notes of interest to South Dakotans:

Solar Cheaper than Nuclear: A study by two researchers at Duke (Duke! They've got basketball; they must be reliable!) finds solar power may now be able to generate electricity per kilowatt-hour more cheaply than new nuclear power. Photovoltaic systems have dropped 50% in price since 1998, while construction costs for new nuclear plants have boomed (though the industry guys would prefer we didn't use nuclear and boom in the same sentence). The Duke data looks at costs in North Carolina, which has about the same solar power potential as central South Dakota. The Black Hills have even better PV potential—time for solarpanel hats on Mount Rushmore! Read the full report in PDF glory here.

No Need for Ethanol Subsidies: Here's South Dakota's big chance to get off the government teat! Iowa State University econ prof Bruce Babcock finds that ending the ethanol blenders credit and the import tariff would "have neither the dramatic, adverse effect U.S. ethanol producers claim, nor create the export bonanza Brazilian producers hope for." Professor Babcock says ending these industry subsidies would result in the loss of maybe 300 jobs, not the 112,000 to 160,000 the ethanol industry claims. Without subsidies, ethanol production would still increase, while we would save a few pennies per gallon at the pump and shave a several billion dollars off the deficit each year (just as all of our Congressional candidates want to do).

Of course, Babcock's study was funded by the Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association. Brazil produces 7 billion gallons of ethanol from sugarcane each year, behind only the U.S., which makes 12 billion gallons of corn ethanol annually.

But note that U.S ethanol producer Valero—you know, the nice folks who bought VeraSun's ethanol plants after VeraSun went broke, and the third-largest ethanol producer in America—says it wouldn't reduce ethanol production one bit if we cut subsidies.

A Really Smart Grid Supports Local Energy Production over Long-Distance Transmission

I'm all about President Obama's plan to pump $3.4 billion into the smart grid, technology that will lower your electric bill, make our energy distribution system more resilient, and take a big chunk out of the $150 billion annual negative impact of power outages. I even appreciate the President's shout-out to South Dakota, as he noted smart-grid tech is essential to promoting renewable energy and supporting the longer-distance transmission lines that would let Chicago utilities plug in to South Dakota wind power (and solar power! Don't forget our big solar potential!).

But hold your horses, Mr. President: who says we should build our energy policy around long-distance transmission? Not John Farrell, who's coming to Brookings Saturday to talk about why we should say no to transmission and focus on local energy independence:

Transmission legislation moving through Congress would preempt longstanding state regulatory authority over transmission line approval and siting. The goal is to speed the construction of a $100 to 200 billion interstate transmission superhighway, bringing solar power from the Southwest and wind from the Great Plains to the coasts.

Why is this problematic? Let’s ignore for a moment that most people wouldn’t care to live by a 150 foot tower running through a 200 foot swath of denuded landscape. Or to have their land seized for this purpose by eminent domain.

Many states oppose the new transmission superhighway for two reasons. One, it’s expensive. Two, it undermines efforts to reap the economic rewards of renewable energy self-reliance [John Farrell, "Say No to Transmission," Marc Gunther's blog, 2009.10.24].

Farrell says we would do more to promote clean energy and local economic development by producing our own alternative energy and using that power locally. Forget the tree-hugging: on the purely economic side, Farrell says one locally owned wind turbine can produce a million dollars of economic activity. Plus, "Locally owned wind projects can create twice the jobs and 3 to 4 times the economic impact of absentee owned projects."

Thanks for your forward thinking on energy and technology, Mr. President, but let's aim more of that $3.4 billion in smart grid money toward supporting the efforts of states and communities to produce their own energy.

Sun-Worshipping Son Worshippers: St. John's Monks Bring Solar to Prairie

I've been so busy focusing on wind power (you're thinking, what do you expect from a windy guy like Cory?) that I've ignored another potential boon for alternative energy in South Dakota: solar power.

But don't take my word for it: talk to the brothers at St. John's Abbey in Minnesota. They're doing the Lord's work by building the biggest experimental solar farm in the upper Midwest. By the end of November, the abbey will have installed 1820 solar panels on 3.9 acres next to their campus. The panels will use a tracking system that turns them toward the sun, boosting juice by 15%. The system will generate 575,000 kilowatt-hours of electricity, the equivalent of the power used by 65 homes.

Put that in local perspective: we could cover the old beanfield in the middle of which our house sits with similar panels and generate power for every house on the west side of Lake Herman.

Now sure, we have our cloudy spells, just like we have our calm spells when wind turbines won't spin. But South Dakota's weather is a lot like Minnesota's—if I'm reading this map right, South Dakota actually has better solar potential than Minnesota, and the monks in Collegeville are making a go of solar. This fact sheet provided by St. John's Abbey says solar power is a great fit for our neck of the continent:

• Minnesota (and thus South Dakota) has better solar resource available than Germany, yet Germany leads the U.S. in solar energy production.
  
• Solar power depends on electronics, and electronics run better in cooler weather.
  

Cooler weather—know any place with weather like that?

Nathan Franzen of Westwood Renewables, the Eden Prairie outfit helping the brothers get some sun, makes the sale for you shadowy skeptics:

Franzen said most people don't think Minnesota is a good area for solar energy technology, but it actually is.

"The main reason for that is that solar works more efficiently in cooler temperatures," said Franzen. "So if you take this solar system and put it in New Mexico, on the same sunny day, it will actually produce more in Minnesota because of the cooler temperatures than it will on a hot day in New Mexico" [Ambar Espinoza, "St. John's Abbey Gets Upper Midwest's Largest Solar Farm," Minnesota Public Radio, 2009.10.07].

Xcel Energy, the same folks greening the Metrodome with wind power, is supporting this solar project with a $2-million Renewable Development Fund grant.

And why are the Benedictine brothers so committed to getting their solar freak on?

The Benedictine tradition at Saint John's Abbey advocates a strong commitment to good stewardship of its resources. Incorporating solar energy to the campus's energy sources is the first major step in the Abbey's initiative to broaden and strengthen the monastic community's commitment to green energy-and to education.

Just two years ago, under then-president Br. Dietrich Reinhart, Saint John's University was a charter signatory of the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment in 2007, which directs Saint John's to the ultimate goal of carbon neutrality as part of an ongoing commitment to good stewardship.

Saint John's Abbey and Saint John's University see themselves as responsible for the campus's natural environment and seek to take a leadership role in educational activities to promote environmental awareness, global thinking, and collaboration on the local level ["Saint John's Abbey Goes Solar! Construction on Solar Photovoltaic Project to begin in October 2009"].

Even conservatives can recognize that this kind of environmentalism isn't a secular humanist plot to destroy America. Local solar power, right alongside wind and other alternatives, is good Christian thinking: making the best use of the resources we have and doing good for the community.

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p.s.: President Obama is announcing $3.4 billion in grants to promote smart-grid technology... exactly the kind of tech that will make distributed solar and wind generation more useful.

pp.s.: Not that you need any more reasons than local self-sufficiency and ending dependence on fossil fuels to say, "Go monks, go solar!" but you know that story fueled by Drudge and the new Freakonomics book that the last ten years have brought a cooling trend, meaning action on climate change is just silly? An independent statistical analysis finds that claim bogus. "The last 10 years are the warmest 10-year period of the modern record," said NOAA climate monitoring chief Deke Arndt. "Even if you analyze the trend during that 10 years, the trend is actually positive, which means warming" [Seth Boronstein, "Analysis Rejects 'Global Cooling' Claims," AP via MPR.org, 2009.10.26].

Pass ACESA II: The New China Syndrome

[Part 2 of a series based on my conversation with the gents from Repower South Dakota and the Environmental Law & Policy Center.]

In previous conversations about the American Clean Energy and Security Act, I've heard some people suggest that we'd be silly to hamstring our economy with more environmental regulations while China and our other global competitors chug along with their old polluting energy sources. There's debate about whether ACESA would hamstring our economy (Paul Krugman doesn't think so), but I posed the global question to my friends at RSD and ELPC: Can we afford to impose regulations like ACESA on ourselves in a global market where China, India, and other countries can keep pumping out CO₂?

Pass ACESA
a Madville Times series

1. Cap and Trade Works
2. The New China Syndrome
3. Market Solving Already?
4. Techno-Hope
5. Perfect vs. Good
6. Smart Grid
7. The Big Picture

Read H.R. 2454, The American Clean Energy and Security Act

The simple answer: we can't afford not to.

ACESA creates incentives, through carbon cap-and-trade and other policies, to spur invention and innovation in energy creation and energy conservation.

China may wait for the U.S. and other developed countries to act on carbon emissions, but it won't wait to make a buck and take the lead in high-tech clean energy manufacturing. China is investing in solar and building it cheaper than the U.S.; China already makes six times more solar cells than we do. China is becoming a leader on clean-coal technology. The Chinese don't need climate-change arguments to convince them to push for alternative energy. The Chinese see alternative energy technology as a solution to the problems of a bigger population, much worse pollution (including 750,000 preventable deaths each year due to air pollution alone), and fewer natural resources than the U.S. They also see dollar signs:

Moreover, Beijing – just like US President Barack Obama – sees renewable energy as an economic boon. Building out a new global energy industry over the next half century will generate more business than any other sector, Chinese officials predict, and they want a hefty chunk of that business. “This gives us an opportunity to develop a new area for a new industry” says Professor Li [Junfeng, deputy head of energy research at China’s top planning agency]. “It’s good for our long-term development.”

...“China sees [green technology] as an enormous market that is not claimed or controlled by any one nation, and there is an opportunity for them to do it,” says [China Greentech Initiative's Ellen] Carberry. “The combination of urgency; the enormous needs; a focused, systematic planned government; an army of engineers; and access to capital may define China as the platform for the green- technology industry globally” [Peter Ford, "China's Green Leap Forward," Christian Science Monitor, 2009.08.10].

New energy technology is where we will find the jobs and economic growth of the 21st century. The country that takes the lead in producing and using energy more cleanly and efficiently will be the next generation superpower. We do not want to let a tech gap develop between us and China. Remember the S in ACESA: Security. We don't have energy security now with 30% of our crude oil coming from OPEC. We won't have energy security if our solar panels and other low-carbon energy tech are stamped "Made in China."

Remember also that, in a broader analysis, America's reliance on imports is part of why the economy went to heck in a handbag last year. For several years America has made less and imported more; countries like China and Germany consumed less and exported more. China, Germany, et al. thus had growing pots of money saved up in the bank. Those savings became relatively cheap sources of investment capital for riskier and riskier Wall Street games... and those of you with stock portfolios and IRAs know how that turned out. At their meeting in Pittsburgh last week, the G20 leaders talked about exactly that problem and agreed the U.S. needs to consume less and produce more to lower its trade deficit, while other countries need to rely less on exports and buy more stuff.

If we sit back and let China take the lead in building solar panels and other new energy tech, we're asking for more of the same problem that put us in our economic hole. As Constant Conservative's Andrew Tople might say, if you're in a hole, step 1 is to stop digging... and pass ACESA!

China is perfectly relevant to a discussion of the American Clean Energy and Security Act. But far from a reason to oppose ACESA, China is exactly why we should pass ACESA. If you like being #2, go ahead, block ACESA. Let China take the lead. Leave America prone to further economic meltdowns. But if you prefer the top of the heap (and I certainly do), then keep America strong by supporting ACESA.