Weatherization Assistance Program

Weatherization Assistance Program Announces Request for Information on Proposed Sustainable Energy Resources for Consumers Grants


March 09, 2010

The U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Weatherization and Intergovernmental Program today announced a Request for Information (RFI) regarding the Department’s proposed Sustainable Energy Resources for Consumers (SERC) Grants for up to $109 million.

Under the Recovery Act, states and local service providers are accelerating the pace of weatherization to create jobs and increase the number of families who can benefit from the energy and cost savings available through the Weatherization Assistance Program. The Weatherization Assistance Program works in partnership with states and more than 900 local service providers to weatherize homes of eligible low-income families.

The purpose of the proposed SERC grants are to speed delivery of weatherization assistance services, promote increased leveraging of federal funding with other funding sources, and identify and develop sustainable energy funding models that are not currently deployed by the Weatherization Assistance Program network.

The Department seeks comments from potential applicants, which include state weatherization agencies and local services providers, and also from other stakeholders.

Contact: scotty@stlouisrenewableenergy.com for additional info

PAYGO imposes spending restrictions on Congress

As someone who has contacted me with your concerns about the budget deficit and the national debt, I wanted to reach out to you now to let you know about important legislation, known as PAYGO (Pay-As-You-Go), that has just been signed into law. PAYGO imposes spending restrictions on Congress and will help bring down the deficit.


PAYGO rules require spending increases and revenue cuts to be paid for by offsetting cuts or revenue-raisers elsewhere in the budget. For example, a proposal to increase spending on highway construction would have to be balanced by increased fees on drivers or a cut to education spending. PAYGO rules were in effect and contributed to the balanced budget of the 1990s, but they were allowed to expire in 2002, leading to irresponsible budget deficits during the past decade.

PAYGO will require Congress to spend wisely on what works and only fund programs and tax cuts that deliver the most bang for the buck. To this end, the legislation also requires the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to assess initiatives across the government to find inefficient or duplicative programs.

PAYGO will help us bring down the deficit responsibly over the long-term. For now, however, the deficit will remain large because the recession has reduced tax revenues and has required the government to take extraordinary measures to save the economy. Extending unemployment and health insurance benefits to the unemployed, temporary and targeted tax cuts to boost demand, and investments in infrastructure, schools and alternative energy help save jobs now and will deliver benefits for years and decades to come. In fact, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office recently concluded that the Recovery Act of last year has already saved or created 1-2 million jobs, and economists agree that many more jobs will be saved or created this year.

Restoring fiscal responsibility will also require us to address several long-term challenges, such as spending on defense and Medicare. Last year, I was pleased to vote in favor of a new law to reform wasteful contracting procedures for military spending. Congress is also continuing to debate health insurance reform legislation that will reduce the deficit over the next decade by spending our health care dollars more effectively. PAYGO will help Congress maintain its discipline in these efforts to reduce spending.

Please do not hesitate to contact me with your views on the budget deficit or any other issue of concern. I also hope you will find my website, carnahan.house.gov, a useful resource for keeping up with my work in Washington and the 3rd District of Missouri, and I welcome you to sign up for my e-newsletter at carnahan.house.gov/update.

A New Solar Energy Source

A New Solar Energy Source from the Common Pea
Provided by: http://www.stlouisrenewableenergy.com/  Submitted by Green Prophet Staff on March 5, 2010 – 2:38 pm

If harnessing the unlimited solar power of the sun were easy, we wouldn’t still have the greenhouse gas problem that results from the use of fossil fuel. And while solar energy systems work moderately well in hot desert climates, they are still inefficient and contribute only a small percentage of the general energy demand. A new solution may be coming from an unexpected source — a source that may be on your dinner plate tonight. Peas!

“Looking at the most complicated membrane structure found in a plant, we deciphered a complex membrane protein structure which is the core of our new proposed model for developing ‘green’ energy,” says structural biologist Prof. Nathan Nelson of Tel Aviv University’s Department of Biochemistry. Isolating the minute crystals of the PSI super complex from the pea plant, Prof. Nelson suggests these crystals can be illuminated and used as small battery chargers or form the core of more efficient man-made solar cells.

Nanoscience is the science of small particles of materials and is one of the most important research frontiers in modern technology. In nature, positioning of molecules with sub-nanometer precision is routine, and crucial to the operation of biological complexes such as photosynthetic complexes. Prof. Nelson’s research concentrates on this aspect.

The mighty PSI

To generate useful energy, plants have evolved very sophisticated “nano-machinery” which operates with light as its energy source and gives a perfect quantum yield of 100%. Called the Photosystem I (PSI) complex, this complex was isolated from pea leaves, crystalized and its crystal structure determined by Prof. Nelson to high resolution, which enabled him to describe in detail its intricate structure.

Described in 1905 by Albert Einstein, quantum physics and photons explained the basic principles of how light energy works. Once light is absorbed in plant leaves, it energizes an electron which is subsequently used to support a biochemical reaction, like sugar production.


“If we could come even close to how plants are manufacturing their sugar energy, we’d have a breakthrough. It’s therefore important to solve the structure of this nano-machine to understand its function,” says Prof. Nelson, whose lab is laying the foundations for this possibility.

Since the PSI reaction center is a pigment-protein complex responsible for the photosynthetic conversion of light energy to another form of energy like chemical energy, these reaction centers, thousands of which are precisely packed in the crystals, may be used to convert light energy to electricity and serve as electronic components in a variety of different devices.

“One can imagine our amazement and joy when, upon illumination of those crystals placed on gold covered plates, we were able to generate a voltage of 10 volts. This won’t solve our world’s energy problem, but this could be assembled in power switches for low-power solar needs, for example,” he concludes.

Solar Power News

Article supplied by: Scotty, St Louis "Renewable Energy" Missouri, written By: JAD MOUAWAD

c.2010 New York Times News Service

INDIANTOWN, Fla. — In former swamplands teaming with otters and wild hogs, one of the nation’s biggest utilities is running an experiment in the future of renewable power.

Across 500 acres north of West Palm Beach, the FPL Group utility is assembling a life-size Erector Set of 190,000 shimmering mirrors and thousands of steel pylons that stretch as far as the eye can see. When it is completed by the end of the year, this vast project will be the world’s second-largest solar plant.

But that is not its real novelty. The solar array is being grafted onto the back of the nation’s largest fossil-fuel power plant, fired by natural gas. It is an experiment in whether conventional power generation can be married with renewable power in a way that lowers costs and spares the environment.

This project is among a handful of innovative hybrid designs meant to use the sun’s power as an adjunct to coal or gas in producing electricity. While other solar projects already use small gas-fired turbines to provide backup power for cloudy days or at night, this is the first time that a conventional plant is being retrofitted with the latest solar technology on such an industrial scale.

The project’s advantages are obvious: Electricity generated from the sun will allow FPL to cut natural gas use and reduce carbon dioxide emissions. It will provide extra power when it is most needed: when the summer sun is shining, Floridians are cranking up their air-conditioning and electricity demand is at its highest.

The plant also serves as a real-life test on how to reduce the cost of solar power, which remains much more expensive than most other forms of electrical generation. FPL Group, the parent company of Florida Power and Light, expects to cut costs by about 20 percent compared with a stand-alone solar facility, since it does not have to build a new steam turbine or new high-power transmission lines.

“We’d love to tell you that solar power is as economic as fossil fuels, but the reality is that it is not,” Lewis Hay III, FPL’s chairman and chief executive, said on a recent tour of the plant. “We have got to figure out ways to get costs down. As we saw with wind power, a lot has to do with scale.”

For solar power, scale is still a relative term. At its peak, the solar plant will be able to generate 75 megawatts of power, enough for about 11,000 homes. But that is dwarfed by the adjacent gas plant, which can produce about 3,800 megawatts of power. (A megawatt is enough to power a Wal-Mart store.)

Utilities are being pulled in different directions. They must ensure that the lights remain on at all times as well as provide the lowest-cost power to their customers. At the same time, they are being pressed to find ways to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and invest in renewable power sources.

The latter is critical if the nation is to succeed in reducing its emissions of carbon dioxide. Power plants account for over a third of domestic greenhouse gas emissions that are responsible for global warming.

“We believe there is a cost to society associated with carbon emissions and not having energy security and not having domestic energy supplies,” Hay said. “But it’s not a level playing field for renewable versus fossil fuels right now.”

Mark Brownstein, an energy and grid specialist at the Environmental Defense Fund, praised FPL’s innovative thinking. “When we talk about getting to a low-carbon, clean-energy economy,” he said, “we know there is not going to be a single technology that is going to transform the industry.”

Currently, 29 states require utilities to increase the amount of power produced from renewable energy, which includes solar, wind, hydroelectric, geothermal and biomass. Last year, Congress considered a federal mandate for 25 percent of renewable power by 2025 as part of its energy and climate legislation. (The bill has since stalled.)

Utilities have been scrambling to meet the state requirements, and many will not be met, according to electrical utility experts.

While renewable power is growing, its share of the nation’s electrical generation remains small. Wind power, which has surged in recent years, accounts for less than 2 percent of the nation’s electrical output. Solar is even smaller. Coal, meanwhile, generates half of the nation’s electrical output, followed by natural gas and nuclear energy.

Part of the challenge in increasing the share of renewable energy sources is to make up for their variable nature — at night, for example, or when the wind does not blow. Because electricity cannot be stored easily, utilities must always produce enough power to meet electric demand at any given time. In practice, this means they need keep a lot of idle plants that can be fired up rapidly when demand spikes.

About 20 percent of the generation capacity overseen by PJM Interconnection, a regional transmission operator covering 13 northeastern and mid-Atlantic states, is used less than 100 hours a year, according to Lester B. Lave, a professor of economics at Carnegie Mellon’s school of business.

“As long as the contribution of wind and solar is very small, utilities can handle it very well,” Lave said. But what happens once the share of renewable power rises to 10 percent? Or 20 percent? “No one knows what the magic number is.”

Spain, which generates more than 12 percent of its electricity from wind, has struggled with wind variability, Lave said. Similar problems are also cropping up in the United States, especially in states where solar and wind power are on the rise. In 2008, for example, Texas narrowly avoided a blackout when wind power, which supplied 5 percent of demand at the time, experienced an unexpected lull, driving wind electricity generation down to 350 megawatts, from 2,000 megawatts, in less than four hours, according to Lave.

It is a problem the industry is beginning to focus on, and hybrid plants could provide part of the answer. By adding renewable power to existing fossil fuel plants that operate around the clock, the thinking goes, utilities could have readily available power that could be fired up instantly whenever their wind or solar resources dropped off.

The Electric Power Research Institute is working on two pilot programs that seek to integrate solar power with traditional coal and gas plants in New Mexico. A dozen hybrid projects similar to FPL’s plant are planned around the world, said Cara Libby, the institute’s project manager for renewable energy.

“Intermittency is probably the challenge utilities are putting the most efforts into researching at the moment,” Libby said. “The biggest concern, of course, is how to keep the power on.”

Instead of adding new capacity, smart grid designs and investments in transmission lines could also help balance the contribution of intermittent resources, said Tim Stephure, an analyst at Emerging Energy Research, a consulting firm. Some regional operators, such as PJM, are also encouraging their large customers to cut consumption when demand is at its peak to reduce the overall power requirements on the grid, said Brownstein of the Environmental Defense Fund.

At FPL, part of the challenge will be to fine-tune the system so that its gas and solar components provide just as much electricity as needed at any given time — day or night, cloudy or clear. At a cost of $476 million, the solar project, known as the Martin Next Generation Solar Energy Center, will be second-biggest, after the 310-megawatt Solar Electric Generating System in the Mojave Desert in California. That system, also owned by FPL, was built in the 1980s.

FPL estimates it will cut its natural gas use by 1.3 billion cubic feet each year, the consumption of 18,000 American homes. It will also cut carbon emissions by 2.75 million tons over 30 years, the equivalent of taking 19,000 cars off the road. The solar panels concentrate the sun’s rays into a vacuum-sealed tube that contains a synthetic oil, which heats up to 748 degrees Fahrenheit. The oil is then used to produce steam that is fed into an existing turbine to produce electricity. Using small sensors, the mirrors will be able to rotate during the day to track the sun’s movement. In case of a hurricane, they will flip upside down for protection.

Missouri Voters Approve a Renewable Energy

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) recently released new estimates of the United States’ wind energy potential, which tripled previous estimates of the size of the nation's wind resources. The new study, which was carried out by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and AWS Truewind, finds that the contiguous 48 states have the potential to generate up to 37 million gigawatt hours annually. To put that in perspective, total U.S. electricity generation from all sources was roughly 4 million gigawatt hours in 2009. The estimates show the total energy yield that could be generated using current wind turbine technology on the nation's windy lands. (The estimates show what is possible, not what will actually be developed.)


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Along with the state-by-state estimates of wind energy potential, NREL and AWS Truewind have developed wind resource maps for the United States and for the contiguous 48 states that show the predicted average wind speeds at an 80-meter height. The wind resource maps and estimates provide local, state, and national policymakers with accurate information about the nature of the wind resource in their areas and across the nation, helping them to make informed decisions about wind energy in their communities.

Why Has Wind Energy Potential Gone Up?

The new estimates reflect substantial advances in wind turbine technology that have occurred since the Department of Energy's last national wind resource assessments were conducted in 1993. For example, previous wind resource maps showed predicted average wind speeds at a height of 50 meters, which was the height of most wind turbine towers at the time. The new maps show predicted average wind speeds at an 80-meter height, the height of today's turbines. Because wind speed generally increases with height, turbines built on taller towers can capture more energy and generate more electricity. The new estimates also incorporate updated capacity factors, reflecting improvements in wind turbine design and performance.

Provided by: Scott's Contracting St Louis "Renewable Energy" Missouri  Email scottscontracting@gmail.com  for your Green Building Needs

$3,000 for energy audits and improvements, Government Funding

Obama Unveils ‘Cash for Caulkers’ Rebates for Energy-Efficient Retrofits


Homeowners eligible for up to $3,000 for energy audits and improvements.

March 2 -- President Obama today announced the details of “Homestar,” a Cash for Clunkers-like rebate program designed to entice Americans to make their houses more energy efficient.

Under the proposal, homeowners could be eligible for up to $3,000 in rebates for purchases of efficient product upgrades or whole-house audits/retrofits. Obama wants the program, dubbed “Cash for Caulkers” and first mentioned in his January State of the Union address, included in a jobs package being drafted by Congress.

The administration hopes the incentives will boost demand for building products such as insulation, efficient windows, and roofing in the same way car sales skyrocketed last year when consumers were offered rebates for trading in their gas-guzzling autos for more fuel-friendly models. The White House says the program would create “tens of thousands” of jobs, cut energy bills for families by $200 to $500 per year, and reduce the nation’s dependence on oil.

In a statement, the NAHB acknowledged the program’s economic possibilities: “This has the potential to be a real shot in the arm for the home building industry,” said association chairman Bob Jones. “It will help put America back to work, and it will help families save on monthly energy bills.”

Administration officials are still working with Congress on details but confirmed the program would cost about $6 billion and that up to 3 million households would participate, according to the Associated Press. Some details, including how long the program will run, have not been worked out with Congress.

“It is going to be politically difficult to do some of this,” Obama said outside Savannah Technical College, the site of his announcement. “I am confident we can do it.”

DETAILS UNVEILED

Under the plan, consumers would collect point-of-sale rebates for energy-efficient purchases. A broad array of vendors, from small independent building material dealers and energy efficiency professionals to large national home improvement chains would market the rebates, provide them directly to consumers, and then be reimbursed by the federal government.

Under the first level of rebates, Silver Star, consumers would be eligible for up to $1,500 for a variety of home upgrades, including adding insulation, sealing leaky ducts, and replacing inefficient water heaters, HVAC units, windows, roofing, and doors. There would be a maximum rebate of $3,000 per home.

The more comprehensive Gold Star level would provide a $3,000 rebate to consumers for a whole-house energy audit and subsequent retrofit tailored to achieve a 20% energy savings. Additional rebates would be available for savings above 20%.

Click here for full details of the Homestar program. Details Can be viewed at: stlouisrenewableenergy.com

Along with the NAHB, building products manufacturers and nonprofit environmental groups heralded the new plan.

“American homes are so wildly inefficient that billions and billions of dollars in wasted energy are holding back our economic recovery,” said Lane Burt, manager of Building Energy Policy at the Natural Resources Defense Council, a wildlife protection organization. “Even the most basic upgrade puts money in our pockets, puts Americans back to work, and puts energy waste on the run.”

Masco Home Services president Larry Laseter, one of three manufacturers who joined President Obama at the announcement, urged Congress to approve the program. “We applaud the efforts of the administration to introduce a jobs creations program that is truly a win-win-win," said Laseter. "The Homestar program will put our nation's skilled construction force back to work, benefit homeowners through comfort and energy-efficient improvements to their existing homes, and result in long term energy efficiency gains.”

The National Lumber and Building Material Dealers Association was more cautious, telling EcoHome's sister publication ProSales that it will be working closely with the White House, the DOE, and Congress to help ensure the program does not put small and large independent dealers at a disadvantage over big-box retailers.

The NAHB also expressed that equal access for everyone will be essential to the program's success.

By:Jennifer Goodman, Senior Editor Online for EcoHome.
Provided by: Scotty, Scott's Contracting, St Louis "Renewable Energy" Missouri

Illinois' Green Energy Finance Initiative

March 2, 2010


Illinois' Green Energy Finance Initiative

A recent initiative from Illinois may serve as a model for other states that hope to attract green energy projects and stimulate economic development.

by Marnin Lebovits, Illinois Finance Authority

There are plenty of reasons to encourage and support the development of renewable energy projects. But in this down economy, the credit markets are typically discouraging. Here in Illinois, we've found a way to open new doors to financing renewable energy projects because we know they're good business–and good for our state.

Like other states, Illinois recognizes the climate and environmental benefits from generating power from renewable energy sources. We know that developing these projects will reduce our region's dependence on foreign oil.

Renewable energy will also help to meet state renewable portfolio standard (RPS) targets. Illinois established its targets in August 2009 and requires that by 2025 one-quarter of all of the power used annually in Illinois must be generated from renewable energy sources. Of this amount, 75 percent of the renewable power used must be generated from wind projects. This requirement has created a significant interest in renewable energy projects, especially wind projects. Also, like other states our state wants, to the extent possible, to provide incentives to help reduce the cost of power generation from these projects so that savings can be passed on to ratepayers.

Finally, renewable energy projects will spur economic development and provide a secure revenue stream for many farmers and other property owners struggling during this recession. The projects will create jobs–many in depressed, rural regions of the U.S., where municipalities will also benefit from the increased tax revenue sparked by such development.

Challenges for Project Finance

Despite these benefits, developers typically face serious obstacles when they attempt to finance renewable energy projects. Capital markets continue to face severe challenges, and the ability for developers to obtain traditional project financing is much more limited than in the past. Only a handful of financial institutions will provide loans for renewable energy projects, including wind farms. Even then, the terms and conditions for the loans are quite arduous.

Most recent transactions include loan terms of only 5 or 7 years, with a 20-year amortization period, generating significant refinance risk in most cases. Developers with the ability to raise capital in other forms, either on a portfolio basis or through a rated parent entity, are forced to prioritize projects in different stages of development across the U.S. market and even around the world.

To better compete, the Illinois legislature created new financing tools to aggressively attract renewable energy projects to our state. The state's approach might serve as a model for others hoping to attract similar types of development

The Illinois Solution

The Illinois legislature recently passed a bill adding renewable energy projects to the portfolio of developments eligible for assistance through the Illinois Finance Authority (IFA), which provides expert, hands-on support to help businesses get the capital they need for growth.

The IFA's assistance for renewable energy will come in the form of up to $3 billion of loan guarantees for project debt. This project finance can contain long-term tenors to fully repay the project debt, thereby eliminating the risk of refinancing. The loan guarantees will be secured by the state's moral obligation. While moral obligation is not a full faith and credit guarantee, it is a model that has been used extensively in the municipal finance markets, and it's used often in Illinois. As of September 2009, the State has outstanding debt (unrelated to this renewable energy finance initiative) of over $100 million using this model. Eight state agencies have the ability to issue moral obligation-supported debt totaling around $1.5 billion for local governments and economic development purposes. Clearly, this is an important funding tool.

These incentives will reduce a project's financing costs by an estimated 100 to 175 basis points. Combined with other incentives offered by the state, such as grant funding available from the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity for renewable energy projects, Illinois' incentive package is drawing attention from developers. In fact, the IFA late in 2009 was already reviewing a number of renewable energy projects for inclusion in this program in anticipation of the legislation's effective date, January 1, 2010.

Private Sector Debt Loan Guarantees

Under the first of three IFA funding models, a developer can work with its traditional project finance lenders and add the IFA as a partner, providing a "loan guarantee" to private sector lenders. The private sector lender would also have the support of Illinois' moral obligation pledge.

Lenders will need to first look to the renewable energy project revenues to cover the debt service. If the project doesn't generate enough revenue, the lender (or lead arranger bank for a syndicated loan transaction) may call in the IFA. The addition of the state's moral obligation may allow the private sector lenders to extend the term of their project debt, possibly even to fully amortize the debt (based upon the tenor of the power purchase agreement) and should help to reduce the cost of the private sector financing.

In a second financing model, the IFA would issue bonds secured by both project revenues and the state's moral obligation support. The IFA would then loan the bond proceeds to the project developer to pay for project construction. Again, the first repayment source for the debt service on the bonds is project revenues. Illinois will be called upon by the Bond Trustee to fund any debt service deficiency on a moral obligation basis. In this instance, the tenor of the bonds could be set to correspond to a final term that will be near the PPA maturity, fully amortizing the project debt. The bond investors will assume the project risk. However, investors will also benefit from the security of the guarantee of the State of Illinois on a moral obligation basis. This additional security will reduce the project's interest rate.

A Third Option

These two models can be combined with the private sector providing a loan for a shorter-term piece and bonds issued for a longer-term piece of the debt financing. For example, the IFA can provide a loan guarantee to private sector lenders on their shorter-term financing (also known as "Series A") and the IFA can be the lender, on a pari-passu basis (in other words, without partiality) for a "Series B" financing that will represent the debt's longer-term portion. The combination of the proceeds from the Series A and Series B financings will provide the total debt funding for the project, thereby reducing total debt service costs and eliminating the refinance risk of traditional private sector funding.

The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) loan guarantee program for renewable energy projects requires a participating lender (either a financial institution or an economic development authority) to share risk with the DOE. Although the IFA intends to work with projects participating in the DOE program, it is not required.

To back its push for renewable energy projects the state created the Illinois Energy Team (IET) to help review environmental and technical aspects of renewable energy projects and help expedite project development. The IET includes specialists from the state university system, Argonne National Laboratory and state agencies such as the Illinois Finance Authority, the Illinois Power Agency, the Illinois EPA and the state Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity. This panel reviews feasibility studies and reports, evaluates technology, and considers project siting, grid interconnection and environmental impact issues. The IET will also provide a forum for developers to work with various state agencies to help projects come to fruition.

The box presents a sample of the expected terms and conditions for the moral obligation support from the State of Illinois. These terms and conditions — subject to change — represent traditional project finance criteria.


The IFA has accepted program applications for three wind projects. Inquiries have come in from developers involved in virtually all renewable energy sectors, including wind, solar, clean coal, geothermal, biodiesel and biomass.

Marnin Lebovits joined the Illinois Finance Authority as a senior funding manager in August 2009 and helped create program guidelines and credit criteria. For the last 20 years prior to joining the IFA, he has been active in municipal and project finance, managing and actively participating in the municipal and project finance groups for both Sumitomo Bank and DEPFA BANK. Mr. Lebovits received his MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and is a CPA.
For more information on this Illinois financing initiative, contact Mr. Lebovits at 312-651-1344 or mlebovits@il-fa.com.