ENERGY NOTES
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By Dean Gallea, Energy and Conservation Committee
The Village has been participating in a demand response program through Sustainable Westchester over the last few years, and this past year was recognized as a top revenue earner. Demand Response involves reducing energy usage during a few peak times during the year, usually on the hottest of summer days, when energy use is at its peak and it is challenging for the utilities to provide enough to meet the demand. On peak days they have to turn to the dirtiest most expensive form of power generation to meet the demand, so it is in their interest to incentivize customers to reduce usage. Tarrytown earned $5,839 through its participation. Regular households can also participate. Interested in signing up? Visit the Grid Rewards program through Sustainable Westchester.
Warner Library on track to upgrade its HVAC
The ancient gas boilers and A/C chillers at the Warner Library are due for an upgrade. The Director and Board are engaging in a study of the system with an eye towards replacing the HVAC with one that is heat-pump-based. That would shave energy costs in the long run, improve reliability, and make the Library a more comfortable environment for patrons.
Con Ed’s default electric price jumped in May
Heatmap.com’s Electricity Price Hub shows how the price for ConEd’s default electricity spiked to nearly 39 cents/kWh in May, then settled back to about 33 cents. Most of what you pay is for transmission and distribution, not for the generated energy itself.
If you contract, as I do, with a fixed, renewably-sourced energy supplier, you can avoid the generation bumps, though you’ll still face the variations in ConEd’s distribution rate.
New York’s clean energy bright spot: Booming rooftop solar
New York is behind on its development of clean energy. Its offshore wind buildout has stagnated - partly due to Federal actions. There is limited free space and sunlight for utility-scale solar. But one source of green power is expanding faster than expected: rooftop solar. New Yorkers installed 8 gigawatts of distributed solar capacity, putting the state ahead of schedule moving toward its legally-binding goal of 10 gigawatts by 2030. “New York continues to set the bar high as we mark another milestone for solar within our communities across the state,” New York Governor Kathy Hochul said. “This is low-cost, reliable clean energy that is delivering cost savings for families and businesses while expanding the availability of renewable energy which benefits our environment, our economy and contributes to New York’s diverse energy resource mix.” Given the price of electricity and the “no-brainer” economics of rooftop solar, it’s a wise idea to get a free assessment to find out if your house is suitable for equipping. Go to https://sustainablewestchester.org/residentialsolarize/ and get solarized!
Champlain-Hudson Power Express (CHPE) back up and running again
We’d been anticipating good things from two power-transmission projects aimed at bringing more renewably-generated electric energy from upstate NY to the NYC Metro area, where it's sorely needed. These were going to use the bed of the Hudson River as a major “right of way” for their cables, carrying gigawatts of carbon-free electricity. But the one slated to carry energy from windfarms - the Clean Path project - was cancelled when it could not strike a deal for ratepayer subsidies. The other - the 339-mile CHPE - began bringing 1.25 GW of hydropower from Canada in May this year, but had issues in early July with circuit-breakers tripping due to problems with the land-based cable on the U.S. side. It was repaired as of July 25th, bringing needed energy into the Metro area and reducing the need to run dirty peaker plants to keep the grid supplied during heat waves.
Wherever it fits department
Most utility-scale solar farms are installed on relatively-flat areas, such as this one I saw in Spain in June. There is often pushback against large solar farms that are placed on land that might otherwise be cultivated to produce food:
But, as the amazing photo below shows, China is repurposing agriculturally-unusable land to produce solar energy.
Worldwide, the most economical ways to add new utility-scale electricity supply remain solar photovoltaic and battery storage, with the exception of wasteful and polluting natural-gas turbines.
