Massachusetts community microgrid projects solicited

A Massachusetts economic development agency focused on clean energy has launched a program seeking to catalyze the development of community microgrids throughout Massachusetts.

Generally speaking, a microgrid is a localized power grid that can disconnect from the traditional grid to operate autonomously.  According to the U.S. Department of Energy, a microgrid's ability to operate while the main grid is down means microgrids can strengthen grid resilience and mitigate disturbances, while enabling faster system response and recovery once reconnected to the main grid. Microgrids can also support flexibility and efficiency, by enabling the integration of growing deployments of renewable and distributed energy resources like solar, and by reducing energy losses in transmission and distribution.
 
A "community microgrid" could be defined in several ways, but a typical definition focuses on a multi-user microgrid providing electrical and/or thermal energy to multiple consumers, integrated with and supported by the local community, relevant utilities, and building or site owners.  As with other microgrids, a community microgrid implementation could reduce energy costs and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, while providing increased energy resilience.

While federal support for microgrids has existed for years, states are now becoming active in exploring how microgrids can help meet society's energy needs and policy goals. Massachusetts is one hotbed of interest in microgrids, and a recently announced program could help stimulate the microgrid industry. The Massachusetts Clean Energy Center’s (MassCEC) Community Microgrids Program anticipates providing about $75,000 in funding to support each of 3 to 5 prospective community microgrid projects with the following characteristics:

• Are community, multi-user microgrids (as opposed to single owner or campus-style microgrids) located in Massachusetts -- but MassCEC will consider proposals from Applicants with an existing campus wishing to extend the microgrid to additional parties outside of its borders;
• Demonstrate significant potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions through the integration of energy efficiency, Combined Heat and Power (“CHP”), renewable energy systems, electric and/or thermal storage technologies, demand management, energy efficiency, and other relevant technologies;
• Have the active and engaged support of the local utility (either investor-owned or municipal light plants) and other relevant stakeholders;
• Encompass a public or private critical facility, including but not limited to schools, hospitals, shelters, libraries, grocery stores, service (gas) stations, fire/police stations or waste water treatment plants;
• Support the distribution system by addressing capacity concerns, providing black start capability, facilitating renewables integration, or providing other services that are meaningful to the local utility;
• Attract third party investment; and 
• Highlight Massachusetts-based clean energy/microgrid technology.

MassCEC is presently soliciting Expressions of Interest from groups interested in participating in feasibility assessments for community microgrid projects meeting its defined criteria.  According to MassCEC, respondents may include municipalities and their public works departments, electric distribution companies, municipal light plants, emergency services departments, owners of critical infrastructure such as hospitals and financial institutions, self-organized groups of commercial building owners, developers or any other actor that either owns property within a potential microgrid or can demonstrate that they represent stakeholders with the capability of developing a community microgrid.  Support from the local government and the relevant electric or gas distribution company is also required.

MassCEC says it intends its funding to support feasibility assessments to advance the selected microgrid projects through the early project origination stages, enabling them to attract third-party investment. Projects that produce a favorable feasibility assessment may then be eligible for additional technical assistance or grants for later stages of project development

Completed expressions of interest, including all required documentation, must be received by MassCEC by Friday, June 23, 2017 by 4:00pm. MassCEC anticipates awarding the first round of feasibility assessments in Q3 2017.

Distributed generation is growing

Customer-sited generation is growing in the U.S.  A look at some of the distributed generation projects that came online in September 2014 shows that universities and institutions are developing projects powered by natural gas, solar photovoltaics, and oil, thanks to policies such as remote net metering and support for microgrid development.

At the University of California at Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz Cogeneration Associates has brought online a new 4.4 megawatt natural gas-fired cogeneration plant. The power generated is used on-site at the UC Santa Cruz campus.   Meanwhile the new unit will generate more than twice as much useful heat as the existing cogeneration unit, with a capacity of 1,391 tons (16,693 kBtu/h) of heating.

At the University of California at Riverside, Solar Star California XXIX LLC’s 3 megawatt UC Riverside Solar project is now online.  All of the power generated is used on-site at the UC Riverside campus, with the project's peak load representing about 30% of the campus's base load.  The University partnered with SunPower Corporation to install the 10.92-acre solar farm on campus open space.

Farther east, Cornell University’s 2 MW Snyder Road Solar Farm project came online. The power generated is used on-site at the Cornell University campus.  Cornell’s first solar photovoltaic project includes a 2MW tilt rack-mounted array on eleven acres of Cornell property in the Town of Lansing.  The Snyder Road Solar Farm is expected to produce 2.5 million kilowatt-hours annually, covering about 1 percent of Cornell’s total electricity use, and is expected to reduce the university’s annual greenhouse emissions by 625 metric tons per year.

Santa Fe Community College’s 1.5 MW Santa Fe Community College Solar project in Santa Fe County, New Mexico is online. The project is sited on 5.4 acres on campus, and consists of 4,620 SunPower 327-Watt photovoltaic modules mounted on fixed racking.  The power generated is used on-site at the Santa Fe Community College campus, generating approximately 43% of the college’s electricity demands, and saving the college more than $200,000 annually.  

Connecticut Municipal Electric Energy Cooperative’s 10 MW oil-fired Matlack Road Microgrid project in New London County, CT is online.  CMEEC supplies power and related electric services to municipal utilities and other wholesale customers that, in turn, provide electricity to roughly 70,000 residential, commercial/industrial and small business customers across the state.  The $9 million Matlack Road Microgrid project serves as emergency backup power for the Backus Hospital campus and adjacent critical facilities including schools, emergency shelters, fire station, supermarket / pharmacy, public water supply, gas station and a shopping center in the event of a sustained power outage.

Businesses and institutions choose distributed generation for a variety of reasons, but most hope for reduced costs and improved reliability compared to traditional utility service.  Will distributed generation continue to grow in the U.S.?  How will utilities -- and policymakers -- adapt as customers continue to adopt consumer-sited generation?

Hospital energy use in focus

Hospitals provide essential services to society - but many hospitals consume large amounts of energy in fulfilling their mission.  Newly released data shows that large hospitals tend to consume more energy per square foot than do other commercial buildings.

The data released by the U.S. Energy Information Administration last week comes from the 2007 Commercial Buildings Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS).  While 2007-vintage data may seem a bit stale in 2012, the 2007 survey results are the most recently-released from the CBECS program, providing an update to the 2003 survey.  The survey considered the consumption of electricity, natural gas, fuel oil, and district heat (steam or hot water from an outside source used for heating) by a variety of types of commercial buildings.

According to EIA, the roughly 3,040 large hospitals operating in 2007 - defined as those over 200,000 square feet - consumed 458 trillion British thermal units (Btu) of energy in that year.  Of this total energy budget, most came in the form of natural gas and electricity: 208 trillion Btu of natural gas, 194 trillion Btu of electricity, 6 trillion Btu of fuel oil, and 49 trillion Btu of district heat.

Altogether, large hospitals consumed about 5.5% of the commercial sector's total energy consumption in 2007.  On a Btu per square foot basis, the EIA data suggests that large hospitals' energy intensity exceeds that of other commercial building types, with large hospitals accounting for only 2% of commercial floorspace in 2003.

This energy intensity may not be surprising: hospitals are typically open around the clock, have high demands for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning, and are home to a variety of energy-intensive activities ranging from laundry and food service to sterilization and computer servers.  Hospitals' need for a high degree of electric service reliability have led 95% of large hospitals to use energy for generating their own electricity, mostly in the form of fuel oil-fired emergency back-up generation.

At the same time, most hospitals' consciousness about their energy footprint has led them to pursue energy efficiency.  The EIA data shows that most large hospitals have energy management and conservation plans, and use energy-saving products like compact fluorescent lights or sophisticated services to reduce their consumption of electricity.

Still, the EIA data suggests that large hospitals still have room for improvement.  What more can hospitals do to reduce their energy footprint and its associated costs, while continuing to provide the services society demands?