The Current - September 2010
Articles In This Issue:
- Thought leaders, top innovators and business opportunities - Maryland Clean Energy Summit to deliver world-class expertise
- Pioneers create a clean energy frontier across Maryland
- Laying the foundation of a powerful new sector - Summit speakers tackle thorny issues of financing, regulation and business growth
- Electric cars, smart buildings and biofuels - Trade Show will feature clean energy products, technologies and business opportunities
- Mingle with clean energy mavericks - Awards Banquet creates time to network with industry leaders
- Seminar series explores technological challenges, business opportunities in Smart Grid
- Clean water is key to sustaining our environment
"THE CURRENT" NEWSLETTER SERIES IS MADE POSSIBLE THANKS TO PEPCO HOLDINGS INC:
Thought leaders, top innovators and business opportunities
Maryland Clean Energy Summit to deliver world-class expertise
It’s a day designed to stretch your thinking about clean energy, invigorate your business with new opportunities and put you face-to-face with leading innovators in America’s clean energy sector.
The Maryland Clean Energy Summit 2010, organized by the Maryland Clean Energy Center, will take place October 4 at Baltimore’s Hilton Inner Harbor. Packed with thought leaders and accomplished innovators from industry, academia and government, this one-day event is designed to elevate the clean energy debate in Maryland, and identify opportunities to grow businesses, create jobs, advance technology, educate consumers and benefit the environment.
“I think of this event as an engagement in thought leadership with frontiers-people in clean energy,” said Jill Sorensen, executive director of the Baltimore Electric Vehicle Initiative and a member of the Maryland Clean Energy Center Advisory Board.
Sorensen will moderate a panel discussion about transportation issues in the clean energy sector that will include: Kristin Zimmerman, head of Advanced Technology Infrastructure at General Motors; John Murach, Electric Vehicle Project Manager for BGE; Michael Mahan, Global Product Manager-Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment for General Electric; Tracy Woodard, Director of Government Affairs for Nissan; and Robbie Diamond, CEO of Secure America’s Future Energy.
“These aren’t just any people. We appealed to thought leaders, people taking significant strides forward, people in positions of responsibility with global engagement,” Sorensen said. “These people are making tracks in this market space and they are seeing genuine market opportunities.”
Other panel discussions during the day will focus on financing options for clean energy endeavors, research and development in the clean energy sector, renewable generation, alternative fuels and biomass, and energy management and the built environment.
Each panel will feature world-class clean energy thought leaders including:
- Elizabeth Porter, Director of Energy Initiatives for Lockheed Martin;
- David Myers, Vice President of Engineering and Technology at the Research Triangle Institute;
- Joanne Throwe, Director of the University of Maryland Environmental Finance Center;
- Matt Ferguson, Partner with the National Renewable Energy practice at Reznick Group;
- Scott Sklar, Founder and President of Stella Group;
- Eric Lofquist, President of Magnus International;
- William Prindle, Vice President of ICF;
- And John Spears, President of the Sustainable Design Group.
Discussions at the Maryland Clean Energy Summit will probe some of the thorniest issues in the clean energy sector, including how to encourage consumers to best use the smart grid and how to finance clean energy developments. See “Laying the foundation of a powerful new sector.”
Panel discussions will also explore cutting edge developments in the clean energy sector, including some that are happening right here in Maryland. See “Pioneers create a clean energy frontier across Maryland.”
An accompanying Trade Show, which will be open to the public from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on October 4, will showcase leading edge clean energy products, services and technologies from dozens of exhibitors, including General Electric, Lockheed Martin, Honeywell, New Generation Biofuels, Totus Lighting and Strategic Services International.
An Awards Banquet and reception will top off the Summit with ample time to network with industry leaders, such as Robbie Diamond, CEO of Secure America’s Future Energy; Kristin Zimmerman, head of Advanced Technology Infrastructure at General Motors; Kenneth Locklin, Director of Finance and Investment at Clean Energy Group; David Blazer, director at Bluewater Wind; and Dave Walls, Executive Director of the California Building Standard Commission.
Registration for the Maryland Clean Energy Summit 2010 is limited and going fast. To register, go to www.MDCleanEnergySummit.org.
Pioneers create a clean energy frontier across Maryland
The Maryland Clean Energy Summit 2010 will explore cutting edge developments in clean energy. Some of them are happening in your backyard.
Affordable, net zero homes
Billed as a revolution in new home construction, Nexus Energy Homes and the Sustainable Design Group have broken ground on the state’s first net zero housing development. Located near downtown Frederick, North Pointe will include 58 townhouses and semi-detached homes, priced as low at $290,000.
John Spears, President of the Sustainable Design Group and Chairman of the Maryland Clean Energy Center Advisory Board, said the homes will combine energy efficiency measures – including R-40 insulation in the roof, high-efficiency windows and airtight construction – with clean energy systems, including solar panels, a geothermal system, a total energy recovery system, and a whole-house monitoring system. Consequently, each home will generate as much energy as it uses annually.
“Most zero-energy houses are custom-built homes and cost twice as much,” said Spears, who will participate in a panel discussion about Energy Management and the Built Environment at the Maryland Clean Energy Summit.
The Maryland companies, however, slashed the price of the North Pointe homes by making the bold move of committing to building an entire subdivision of net zero structures.
Sustainable Maryland
This fall, the University of Maryland Environmental Finance Center (EFC) is launching Sustainable Maryland – a certification program designed to help municipalities get the training, tools, expert guidance and funding they need to green their operations, protect their natural resources and stimulate local economies. Officials in New Jersey pioneered the program and are now working with Maryland officials to see if it can be replicated in other states and eventually nationwide.
“The program in New Jersey has been off-the-charts successful. Communities have been outdoing each other,” said Joanne Throwe, EFC Director. Throwe will moderate a panel discussion entitled “Forecasting the climate for finance” at the Maryland Clean Energy Summit.
Sustainable Jersey, Throwe said, helped municipalities do energy audits of public buildings, improve energy efficiency of existing structures, develop sustainable business practices, design high-efficiency buildings, adopt clean energy systems, and establish green design guidelines for commercial and residential developments. It also delivered a boost to the state’s clean energy sector.
EVs for Veterans
The Baltimore Electric Vehicle Initiative (B-EVI) and Autoflex, a veteran- and minority-owned Baltimore fleet management company, are partnering with the Veterans Administration to launch a unique electric vehicle initiative. B-EVI and Autoflex will deploy a high-utilization fleet of EVs to serve military veterans who need transportation to medical appointments, job interviews and other functions.
Veterans will also operate the service, which will involve managing a call center that deploys the vehicles, handling car-sharing operations, data collection and analysis, EV servicing, and the establishment of charging infrastructure.
“Veterans have training, military discipline and engineering skills so we think this is a terrific group of people to begin working with and to give back to,” said Jill Sorensen, Executive Director of B-EVI. Sorensen will moderate a panel discussion of transportation issues in the clean energy sector at the Maryland Clean Energy Summit.
“We are just seeing these vehicles come out this year,” she said. “We will put them into this fleet and collect data that will become a repository for the U.S. Department of Energy and the Clean Cities program. This is a very visionary project and it will put Maryland out there in the position of being a of thought leader.”
Laying the foundation of a powerful new sector
Summit speakers tackle thorny issues of financing, regulation and business growth
Clean energy has the potential to be one of the largest economic stimulators in Maryland. But creating a whole new industry plunges everyone into thorny debates.
How do you hone energy policy, utility regulations, electricity prices, consumer incentives, business assistance, financing options and other elements to best grow the sector, develop technology, stimulate business growth, create new jobs, benefit the consumer and help the environment?
Speakers, including national clean energy thought leaders, will tackle the toughest issues and explore groundbreaking options at the Maryland Clean Energy Summit 2010.
“One key issue is there are a lot of innovations in smart grid coming out right now. It is sort of the wild west for innovation and entrepreneurialism,” said Katherine Hamilton, President of GridWise Alliance and a presenter at the Maryland Clean Energy Summit. “So here you have all these creative, inventive people with incredible solutions, but they are trying to market to an industry that is heavily regulated. How do you allow innovation on the grid when the primary functions of utilities are to provide safe, reliable, cost-effective electricity?”
Smart grid developers, Hamilton added, are wrestling with other huge issues. How can you best enable the built environment to interact with the grid so that it becomes not just a load on the grid, but a resource to the grid? How can you structure electricity pricing and consumer education so that residential and commercial consumers benefit financially from smart grid programs while helping utilities moderate costs and load?
“Smart grid is just an enabling technology. It doesn’t actually do anything by itself,” she said. “But it’s a way to get everything else done – maximize efficiency, maximize renewables.”
If the smart grid is implemented well, she added, researchers estimate it could reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 12-18 percent.
A lot of the biggest issues in the clean energy sector revolve around government policy, said John Spears, President of the Sustainable Design Group, Chairman of the Maryland Clean Energy Center Advisory Board and a presenter at the Maryland Clean Energy Summit.
“Organizing good investment in this sector could make a significant impact and probably deliver the fastest impact of any measure,” he said.
Spears argues that the state should follow the example of at least a dozen other states and direct money into the sector by creating a large clean energy investment fund. Fuelled by funds from government, utilities and/or the private sector, the fund could support technology developments, early stage companies and incentives to make adoption of clean energy more attractive to consumers.
Maryland, Spears added, should also consider establishing a feed-in tariff for solar, wind and other clean power. Such tariffs provide a higher and guaranteed rate for clean energy than conventional energy.
For homeowners who are interested in installing solar panels, “that means that your solar energy becomes more valuable to you than just the savings you get from the system. It has a real cash value,” Spears said. “It means you can go and buy a solar energy system for your house or invest in a solar energy system as a commercial venture. You can then get a contract with someone to buy the electricity for a fixed rate for the next 10-20 years. That fixed income makes it very easy to get financing for your solar system because the bank knows you will have a positive cash flow from the system.”
In Germany, a feed-in tariff has proven to be an extremely powerful tool for stimulating adoption of renewable energy systems, he said.
For more information about the Maryland Clean Energy Summit and to register, go to www.MDCleanEnergySummit.org.
Electric cars, smart buildings and biofuels
Trade Show will feature clean energy products, technologies and business opportunities
Kick the tires – or check the batteries – of an electric vehicle. Compare the latest solar panels, tubes, attic fans and invertors. Learn about the cheapest, cleanest ways to generate hot water at home. Or shop around for financing options for your clean energy business.
The Trade Show of the Maryland Clean Energy Summit 2010 will fill a 20,000-square-foot foyer and part of Eutaw Street on October 4 with the latest clean energy technologies, consumer products, services and financing options. Located in the second-floor foyer of the Hilton Inner Harbor and outside the hotel on Eutaw Street, the show will be open and free to the public from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.
The outdoor portion of the show will include an array of electric vehicles, including a Tesla, an EStar vehicle, Toyota hybrids and GEM cars, as well as a display of vehicle charging stations. Strategic Services International will also set up and operate one of its clean-powered, emergency services centers. Equipped with a photovoltaic array and a 106-foot-high wind turbine, the unit generates enough electricity to power four 2000-square-foot houses. It supports all forms of electronic communications and operates a water-purification plant, enabling it to provide essential services in a disaster area or war zone.
Inside the Hilton Inner Harbor, General Electric, Standard Solar, Honeywell, Lockheed Martin, Envion, Clean Currents, Energy Answers, Reznick Group and dozens of other vendors will showcase clean energy products and services, including high-efficiency lighting, home energy auditing options, biofuel systems and smart-building technologies.
The show is free and open to the public. Come see what some of the leading minds in the clean energy sector have created and how they can help the environment, save consumers money, and create business and job opportunities.
Mingle with clean energy mavericks
Awards Banquet creates time to network with industry leaders
It will be a rare opportunity to rub-elbows with clean energy thought leaders from across the country.
The Maryland Clean Energy Summit 2010 Awards Banquet and Reception will give attendees ample time to network with industry heavy hitters who presented at the daylong summit, attended the summit to generate business opportunities, or received one of the first annual clean energy awards.
Presenters at the Summit will include:
- Robbie Diamond, CEO of Secure America’s Future Energy;
- Dr. Eric Wachsman, Director of the University of Maryland’s Energy Research Center;
- Elizabeth Porter, Director of Energy Initiatives for Lockheed Martin;
- Arthur “Chip” Cotton, Program Manager of Energy R&D for General Electric;
- Cisco DeVries, CEO of Renewable Funding;
- Pat Mahoney, CEO of Energy Answers;
- John Murach, Electric Vehicle Project Manager for BGE;
- Tracey Woodward, Director of Government Affairs for Nissan;
- Derek Robertson, President of Wavebob;
- Eric Lofquist, President of Magnus International;
- Dave Walls, Executive Director of the California Building Standards Commission;
- And Kevin Madden, Vice President of Global Sales for Honeywell.
The evening will feature the first ever Maryland clean energy awards. They will honor a Clean Energy Champion of the Year who has demonstrated vision and proactive leadership to advance clean energy generation and adoption of energy efficiency practices, encouraged the success of the industry sector, and improved consumer awareness of the clean energy economy. They will also honor outstanding individuals in the clean energy sector for their Legislative Leadership, Industry Leadership, Advocacy and Entrepreneurship.
Even if you can’t attend the full-day summit, you can still participate in and benefit from this gathering of clean energy thought leaders. Tickets for the Clean Energy Awards Banquet and Reception are available through www.MDCleanEnergySummit.org.
Seminar series explores technological challenges, business opportunities in Smart Grid
It has the potential to change the way Americans use energy, lower greenhouse gas emissions, help avert an energy crisis, and support technology developments, business startups and job creation. At the same time, it also has the potential to mire the country in privacy debates, burden consumers with higher energy bills, and swallow some entrepreneurs in failed ventures.
The smart grid could radically change the energy industry. But even experts say the concept for a high-tech, more intelligent grid is still in its fledgling state and still in need of intense investigation, development and debate.
“It is good to stimulate discussion about this topic. There are going to be a lot of winners and losers in smart grid,” said Peter Kelly-Detwiler, senior vice president of energy technology services with Constellation NewEnergy.
Kelly-Detwiler who is currently responsible for implementing hundreds of megawatts of load-response resources for Constellation NewEnergy, was speaking at the first Smart Grid Seminar sponsored by the Clean Energy Technology Incubator (CETI) at the University of Maryland Baltimore County Tech Center. CETI plans to hold eight more seminars this fall.
Load-response programs, such as those facilitated by smart grid, have already shown themselves to be effective tools for easing peak energy use and curtailing overall electricity costs. In one year alone, PJM Interconnection – the regional transmission organization that coordinates the movement of wholesale electricity in 13 states and the District of Columbia – paid out $6 million to customers participating in peak-use reduction programs. That investment enabled PJM to purchase less electricity during its highest priced hours and cut the system’s total expenses by $600 million, Kelly-Detwiler said.
The smart grid, he said, will amount to a massive “information play.” Technologies that track, analyze and optimize energy use could be very powerful and profitable in the revamped energy economy.
“The nexus of energy and information is where the value is going to be created,” he said.
Yet developers of smart grid systems are still wrestling with many unknowns, he cautioned. Experts don’t yet know how the adoption of electric vehicles or smart-building systems will affect the grid, whether cloud computing companies will frequently shift data storage locations to capture lower energy prices, or how new energy-pricing systems will alter consumer behavior. They also don’t know how utilities, technology companies, governments and others will control the flow of information about customers’ energy use.
The Clean Energy Technology Incubator – a joint creation of the Maryland Clean Energy Center and bwtech@UMBC – is hosting a series of seminars this autumn.
On Monday, Sept. 20, the next seminar will feature Robert Broadwater, a professor of electric and computing engineering at Virginia Tech, speaking on the topic of “Integrated System Model for Electric Grids.” Professor Broadwater will discuss the progress that utilities have made in implementing Integrated System Models (ISMs) that track millions of objects, including customers, structures and measures. He will demonstrate an ISM model and discuss how the Distributed Engineering Workstation may be used to build an ISM which models transmission, sub-transmission, primary distribution, secondary distribution and all customers in a single model.
Subsequent seminars in October and November will feature:
- Jill Sorensen of the Baltimore Electric Vehicle Initiative on the challenges and opportunities created by electric vehicles;
- Steve Sarnecki of OSIsoft on real-time data monitoring and control for process applications;
- Mahi Reddy of SemaConnect on electric vehicle charging infrastructure;
- Gary Skulnik of Clean Currents on the aggregation of electric power from various energy sources;
- And Aaron Vigil-Martinez from the Maryland Clean Energy Center on potential funding sources for smart grid projects.
To RSVP for the Sept. 20 seminar or get information about future seminars, contact Bjorn Frogner, Entrepreneur-in-Residence at CETI, at bjorn.frogner@gmail.com or 443-534-7671.
Energy Wise Info from Pepco and Delmarva Power
Clean water is key to sustaining our environment
Sustainability is an integral part of Pepco Holding Inc.’s (PHI) strategy to ensure the safe and reliable delivery of energy services to our customers over the long term. As a leader among energy companies in sustainability, we recognize that our business, like all businesses, needs to operate in a manner that uses resources wisely today to maintain our ability to provide reliable services for future generations.
Conserving resources to achieve the smallest possible environmental footprint serves not only to meet the needs of our customers, but also to preserve and enhance the natural resources essential to us all.
Our sustainability strategy is grounded in a policy of increasing innovation and integration of best practices into our operations. One critical resource receiving growing attention from both operations and environmental managers at all Pepco Holdings companies is water. While water consumption is not a major component of our power delivery operations, all industrial operations can affect the quality and supply of water in their immediate environment and in the watersheds that supply precious streams, rivers and large bodies of water such as our Chesapeake Bay.
PHI is continuously seeking and implementing water improvement/conservation initiatives to protect and enhance the water resources in our region. These are in addition to our partnership with the nonprofit Chesapeake Fund, which is launching multifaceted programs to reduce nitrogen pollution in the Chesapeake Bay watershed, widely thought to be the single most effective strategy to achieve significant improvement to the degraded waters of the Bay.
A few of these initiatives include rain garden construction, wetlands protection and restoration, marine flora improvement and sponsorships and hands-on projects to engage and educate the public on the value of water resources and how they can help improve and protect them.
Low-Impact Development (LID) – LID is a technique that reduces river pollution by increasing ground absorption of storm water runoff near its source. Rain gardens are built in low-lying areas with precisely designed layers of soil, sand and organic mulch to filter particulate matter, trace metals and other pollutants to prevent their discharge into the river. The soil holds the rainwater to benefit the garden’s grasses, trees and flowers. The success of the LID method first piloted at Edison Place, PHI’s headquarters in Washington, D.C., and at Pepco’s Benning Service Center, also in Washington, led to a long-term commitment to the Anacostia River Watershed that involves a series of rain gardens at Benning. Rain gardens subsequently have been built at Delmarva Power facilities, and more are planned.
Wetlands Improvement and Protection – Wetlands are a critical component of our region’s natural environment, valuable to animal, avian and human populations. They also serve an important role in maintaining water quality in downstream channels and bodies of water, such as the Chesapeake Bay. PHI companies employ advanced environmental techniques when constructing and maintaining power line rights-of-way in and around wetlands and other sensitive areas. For example, we use specially designed matting to cross wetlands; diverse methods to control erosion and sediment; low-impact vehicle to transport materials and personnel to worksites; and hand clearing of vegetation in sensitive areas. PHI has also been active in restoring wetlands near our facilities. For example, in 2009 the company completed reconstruction of a 24-acre salt marsh in Ocean View, Del. Grid-ditching in the 1930s had altered the habitat structure and negatively affected the ecological functions and values of this wetland. After replacing the linear ditches with a network of meandering tidal creeks and newly created pools and tidal mudflats that are typical of an undisturbed coastal salt marsh, the project has restored a more natural flow of water into and over the marsh, enhancing its habitat value for invertebrates, fish, birds and plant life.