IN HIS ENLIGHTENING TELEVISION SERIES, “The Power of Myth,” Joseph Campbell once described the reality that so often in our lives we spend time and effort on small things or goals when something powerful and transformative is right in front of us: “Standing on a whale, fishing for minnows.” I love the power and insight of that thought.
In Benicia, we are blessed to be able to apply some of the remaining funds of the Good Neighbor Steering Committee/Valero Settlement Agreement on projects of “whale” proportions through the Community Sustainability Commission’s grant process. Citizens, nonprofit organizations, Benicia Unified School District, local businesses and the city may apply by April 18 with plans to implement strategies of the Benicia Climate Action Plan to “reduce greenhouse gas emissions, conserve energy and water, contribute to community sustainability, and thereby reduce Benicia’s overall carbon footprint.”
As a community, we have hard work ahead if we are going to annually reduce between 107,000 and 179,000 metric tonnes of CO2 to meet our greenhouse gas emissions reduction goal for the year 2020. I know and have met innovative and entrepreneurial Benicians (and FOB, Friends of Benicia) whom I am confident are brimming with tangible, substantive and beneficial projects and innovations that would meet the parameters cited above. I also know that at this moment there are groups formulating their grant proposals for this round of grant funding. And . . . I would love to see even more submissions that stretch our thinking, addressing CO2 emissions while either conserving energy and water or producing more renewable energy and recycling/reclaiming water for reuse.
Over the years, I’ve written about:
• Clean Technology employing things like 3D printers, Computer Aided Design and
• Manufacturing
• Electric vehicles
• Solar and wind power
• LED lighting
• “From Poop to Payola” — February 2013 article about the efforts of MinneGrow
• Energy storage
• Sierra Energy’s “Trash into Gas” — gasifier
• Aquaponics
Certainly, you or someone you know can submit a project that will leverage any of these ideas — and beyond — to meet the goals of Benicia’s Climate Action Plan and the criteria of the Community Sustainability Commission’s grant process. There’s still time to submit a proposal!
Here are the criteria:
A. Water/Energy Conservation: Create opportunities for conserving water and energy, reducing GHGs or generating renewable energy. Priority will be given to projects that address CAP strategies identified as high priority by the commission.
B. Quantifiable goals: Assess results on the basis of specific, measurable outcomes. The dictum, “You can’t manage what you can’t measure!” may be a useful guide in planning meaningful, quantitative measures of project success.
C. Collaboration: Work with other organizations and community groups. Encourage and seek collaborative engagement with other organizations, agencies, nonprofits, entrepreneurial “green” enterprises, businesses, citizens or city departments.
D. Outreach: “Spread the word!” Reach out to new or larger segments of the community. Include an advertising, public relations, social media or educational component to enhance the project’s value by creating demonstrable “ripple effects” spreading out through the community.
E. Other Funding Sources: Combine this grant with other funding sources or in-kind donations. Explain how this grant would complement other resources that support project goals. If the project is to continue beyond this grant, describe anticipated resources for such continuation.
F. Experience: Document previous success in project management, and timely completion of previous projects.
The grant rating sheet is above.
How wonderful it will be to see sustainability proposals fishing for projects of “whale” proportions! After all, remember Humphrey, our very own Benicia whale? The world watched and cheered with us on his successful return to the ocean. We certainly are a community with a history of loving whales and all they represent.
Now it’s time for whale-proportioned applications that will “reduce greenhouse gas emissions, conserve energy and water, contribute to community sustainability, and thereby reduce Benicia’s overall carbon footprint.”
Learn more
Community Sustainability Commission Grant application: go to sustainablebenicia.org/ and click on Resources, then click on Community Sustainability Grant Application. You can also check out previously approved grants.
Constance Beutel is a the chair of Benicia’s Community Sustainability Commission. She is a university professor and videographer and holds a doctorate from the University of San Francisco.
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During the campaign season for the last election, a question was posed to all candidates regarding support for a wind energy project on our property assets North of Lake Herman Road. The PG&E high voltage transmission lines are on one of the properties, and the area is a designated Solano County Wind Resource Area. All candidates indicated support, and candidate Dan Smith suggested the potential for a Southern Solano Regional Park, featuring wind turbines. I gave examples of wind energy parks around the nation at a council meeting around the same time.
California is growing in population, increasing demand for water and power. In response to this trend, the PUC routinely grants rate increases to PG&E, and now there are peak demand surcharges that we pay when we are pumping water through various systems to prepare it for potability or clean it for discharge into the Carquinez Straits.
My opinion is that continuing efforts in the name of sustainability are incomplete without a comprehensive assessment of wind energy systems to support water processing and offset time-of-use energy surcharges that erode our General Fund. This would include consideration of large production turbines at Sky Valley area. General Electric is continually developing higher efficiency turbines in Tehachapi, CA. They are at 4.1 megawatt output in one unit now. Ideally, I would like to see the Benicia of the future with numerous GE turbines, including at Southern Solano Regional Park at Sky Valley. The proximity to the transmission lines may exclude placement of a large turbine on the hilltop next to Sky Valley Road, but a few smaller ones may fit. However, the property we own out by the former IT site could support a large turbine or two.
There would be no investment by the city other than staff support to get this moving. A developer would place wind turbines at various locations and we would pay a flat rate per kilowatt hour for a 20 year term in a Power Purchase Agreement. This is a common contract duration in the energy industry. This would be a hedge against both time-of-use surcharges, and rate increases over the next 20 years.
My observation is that after almost three years, there is still no formalized discussion by elected officials regarding the potential locations for municipal wind turbines to offset escalating energy costs. We don’t have the land for expanded solar. The parking lots at Amports could support elevated panels so maybe that can be considered in a partnership energy deal, or even a hybrid large scale energy project by one developer, with both solar and wind.
The open space North of Lake Herman Road is protected from development by our Measure K, but wind turbines are not growth inducing. Our open space zoning allows “micro-utilities” of up to 5 megawatts. This limit should be changed to unlimited output so that wind turbine advancements could be accommodated.
I recognize that wind turbines at Sky Valley are not on the radar of some open space advocates, including members of our council, but we could add a non-binding Advisory Ballot Measure to the November ballot to gauge community support, or lack of, for wind turbines in the open spaces. It would seem that all members would support such a measure in the name of democracy, to let us weigh in on this controversial topic, but three will do it.
Stan I am totally again wind turbines. We must look at economic growth to increase our city budget revenus stream. Do that and the city can handle any increase in electric cost. Remember this country has all the natural gas and it should be utilized. I also believe new technoliogy is starting to control use. Let that happen and wind turbines will be just a thing of the past. Just like TV antennas of the 50’s. I would rather move forward than use old ideas.
The reliability of the power grid is subject to interruption by equipment failures, personnel errors, and now, deliberate attacks by terrorists. This link is a scary account of such an attack, with snipers knocking out transformers http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB10001424052702304851104579359141941621778
De-centralized power distribution is a developing approach to guard against the impacts of major grid outages. We have emergency generators at multiple municipal services sites. We should have wind turbines on our open space properties, not only to offset the increasing costs to draw power from the PG&E grid, but to assure electricity in the event of an upstream grid outage. Although wind turbines would not be able to power the entire municipal and residential load demands in a major grid outage, they would serve to provide emergency power for selected services, street and traffic lights, provided the wind is cooperating as well, but it is rare that the wind is not blowing in this city.
As previously mentioned, wind turbines in the open spaces will be vigorously opposed by some in the community. For the record, I support undeveloped open space, but I maintain that the attitude of the broader community with regard to wind turbines North of Lake Herman Road cannot be determined unless we provide the opportunity to express it via a non-binding Advisory Ballot Measure in November (Every major environmental action group, as well as the Audubon Society, support properly sited wind turbines).
As previously mentioned, subsequent to the expression of support for a wind energy project in the hills during the 2011 campaign season, there has been no public policy level discussion by the council with regard to further study of the matter. To that end, I will be contacting the members of the council to ask for their support of the Advisory Ballot Measure. I will email them all today and report the responses in a letter to the Herald later this week. We only need three members to agree that the community should be allowed to weigh in on what is sure to be a controversial proposal. Failing that, a petition could be advanced to place such a measure on the ballot, but I really don’t want to go that route, and besides, who could be against letting the voters decide what they want, or don’t? It could be that a majority of the voting public does not want wind turbines in open space, but my sense is that the community would welcome further study of the matter, and thus it becomes a political imperative to proceed with discussions by the new council after the election.
Dr. Beutel, what is your opinion of wind turbines in open space, or an Advisory Ballot Measure?
Here is the text of the email I just sent:
Dear Mayor, Vice-Mayor, and members of the Council,
As you all know, I have advocated for more municipal wind turbines in Benicia, and specifically on our open space properties North of Lake Herman Road. As you also know, these properties are within a designated Wind Resource Area as defined by Solano County. Although there is at present a county moratorium on more wind turbines in unincorporated agricultural areas, I do not believe our properties fall in this category, nor do I expect the county to eventually prohibit more turbines.
I’m sure you will agree that the preference of a council majority does not accurately reflect the attitudes of the larger voting public. With regard to the siting of wind turbines on our properties North of Lake Herman Road, I maintain that the community should be afforded the opportunity to express their preference via a non-binding Advisory Ballot Measure included in the November ballot for two council seats.
Accordingly, I request your support for such an opportunity for the voting public, and look forward to your replies.
Respectfully,
Stan Golovich
I like your style Stan. There are still miles ahead for potential improvements to wind and solar technologies. These are energy systems that take direct advantage of the power of the sun striking the earth’s surface here and now; in comparison to fossil fuels, which come to us rather indirectly from the sun striking the earth millions of years ago. That said, I believe the future of energy lies in large scale energy storage. The technology related to energy storage, in the form of large batteries is excelling rapidly. The good news is that a few technologies, like liquid metal, sodium-ion, and lithium-ion, do not utilize and toxic material. A physicist friend of mine was involved in the development of a battery that exploits the ability of vanadium to exist in solution in four different oxidation states, and uses this property to make a battery that has just one electro-active element instead of two; and, without any degradation of performance or efficiency over time (specifically the vanadium redox flow battery – a regenerative fuel cell). Of course the benefit of these batteries is that they optimize the performance of wind and solar systems by storing energy in periods of low demand.
As you indicated, utility scale energy storage is becoming increasingly efficient. Battery packs contained in standard 20 and 40 foot shipping containers will be quite common in the future, in static applications where the consumer has the ability to charge the battery, as well as in the form of energy delivery services, where a freshly charged battery is delivered and the exhausted one taken back for charging.