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New International Clean Energy Fund to Battle Climate Change
President Bush committed to provide $2 billion over the next three years for a new international clean energy technology fund. The President mentioned the fund during his final State of the Union Address, while an accompanying White House fact sheet includes the funding commitment and touts the fund as a tool to help confront climate change throughout the world. The new fund will increase and accelerate the deployment of all forms of cleaner, more efficient technologies in developing nations like India and China. It will also help leverage substantial private-sector capital by making clean energy projects more financially attractive. President Bush first proposed the fund in September 2007 at the First Major Economies Meeting on Energy Security and Climate Change. See the White House fact sheets on the energy aspects of the State of the Union Address (http://www.whitehouse.gov/stateoftheunion/2008/initiatives/energy.html) and on the September 2007 proposal (http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2007/09/20070928-1.html).
DOE offers Solar Technical Assistance
The Department of Energy (DOE) is accepting requests for Technical Assistance for large-scale, high-visibility solar installation projects that have the ability to impact the market for solar technologies through large project size, use of a novel solar technology, and/or use of a novel application for a solar technology. In addition, it is desired that the project be replicable or have replicable components. Large-scale installations may include photovoltaic, concentrating solar power, solar water heating, and solar space heating applications. Technical assistance will not be provided for research, product development, or early stage testing and evaluation of any technology or product. Solar America Showcases focus on providing support to projects in which a commercially ready technology is to be installed in a large-scale application with full financial project commitment already in place.
Regarding the scale of the project, DOE is looking for projects with total capacity in excess of 100 kW. Projects may include multiple sites, and do not have to be co-located. In addition to the initial installation, the kW total may also include planned follow-on activities (direct replication efforts). Examples include installations in residential subdivisions, shopping centers, office buildings or parks, big box retail locations, factories, and utility solar production.
Regarding the novel solar technology, DOE proposes to support projects that introduce new solar technologies that hold the promise of reducing initial costs, simplifying installation, and boosting consumer confidence, but which have little testing to date that demonstrates such improvements. Examples include new cell or module technology, new materials, or innovative installation and mounting techniques. By offering Technical Assistance, DOE envisions helping these new solar technologies develop a performance record in the marketplace, identify technical problems early in mass product releases, and devise solutions and alternatives that move specific solar technologies to cost-competitiveness by 2015.
Regarding the novel solar application, DOE expects to support projects that utilize solar technology in new ways. One example would be to include new methods of building integration beyond traditional roof-mounted modules. DOE also supports innovative designs and methods that open up previously untapped markets or end uses to solar technology adoption. Acceptable Solar Applications could also include those that are currently in use in other geographic areas, but not in the vicinity (State, region) of the proposed site.
For more information, see the Federal Register announcement (73 FR 6172) available at http://www.gpoaccess.gov/fr.
Natural Resources Canada Releases Modeling and Compliance Software
Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) launched the latest version of the EE4 software. Designers can use this tool to model new buildings and determine energy performance relative to the Model National Energy Code for Buildings (MNECB). If the simulated energy performance exceeds the MNECB by at least 25 percent, designers can submit it to NRCan for validation of new building designs (http://oee.nrcan.gc.ca/commercial/newbuildings/validation.cfm). Access to modeling assistance and information on EE4 training also is at this Web site. To download the free software, visit the EE4 Software Web site (http://www.sbc.nrcan.gc.ca/software_and_tools/ee4_soft_e.asp).
President Bush Requests $1.255 Billion for EERE in FY 2009
President Bush unveiled his proposed federal budget for fiscal year (FY) 2009, including $25 billion for DOE. The budget requests $1.255 billion for the DOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), which is essentially equal to the President's budget request for FY 2008 but about 18% lower than the actual FY 2008 funding (not counting congressionally directed funds). Compared to the FY 2008 appropriations, the proposed budget boosts funding for geothermal energy by 51% to provide for field demonstrations of enhanced geothermal systems technologies. The budget also provides a 13.5% funding increase for research and development relating to biomass and biorefinery systems, a similar funding increase for efficient building technologies, and nearly level funding for the Federal Energy Management Program, vehicle technologies, industrial technologies, and wind energy. The budget proposal cuts hydrogen and fuel cell technologies by 69%, deferring hydrogen production research to focus instead on hydrogen storage and fuel cell technologies that are needed to develop a practical fuel cell vehicle by 2015.
The budget increases funding for state energy programs by 13% and proposes $7.5 million in new funding for the Asia Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate. It eliminates funding for Weatherization Assistance Grants, arguing that the energy efficiency retrofit program for low-income households has failed to catalyze broader solutions for the tens of millions of eligible homes that have never received retrofits. It also eliminates the Renewable Energy Production Incentive, which has become less effective as renewable energy technologies have become competitive and as limited funds have been distributed to a growing pool of eligible applicants. See the EERE Fiscal Year 2009 "Budget-in-Brief" (http://www.eere.energy.gov/ba/pba/pdfs/FY09_budget_brief.pdf).
The proposed budget includes $3.2 billion for the President's Advanced Energy Initiative, a 28% increase, and $225 million for the President's Solar America Initiative, with $156 million in the EERE budget and $69 million in the budget for DOE's Office of Science. It also requests $19.9 million for the administrative expenses of DOE's new loan guarantee program, while requesting an extension of its authorization to issue loans through FY 2010 and FY 2011. The FY 2007 appropriations act authorized $38.5 billion in loan guarantees, including $10 billion for renewable energy, energy efficiency, and distributed energy generation, but gave DOE only two fiscal years to issue the loan guarantees. See the DOE press release (http://www.energy.gov/news/5920.htm) and page 42a (PDF page 86) of the explanatory statement that was issued with the appropriations act (http://www.rules.house.gov/110/text/omni/jes/jesdivc.pdf).
California Approves Feed-In Tariffs, Rewards Energy Efficiency
The California Public Utility Commission (CPUC) has approved long-term prices for the state's utilities to buy renewable energy from their customers. For seven of the state's utilities, the so-called "feed-in tariff," approved on January 31, applies to renewable energy systems located at public water and wastewater facilities, but for Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison (SCE), a separate feed-in tariff applies to any customer-located renewable energy system up to 1.5 megawatts in capacity. The tariff requires signing a long-term contract for 5, 10, or 15 years, but the price is adjusted based on the time of day of the power generation. For instance, for a system producing power throughout the day, a 15-year contract signed with SCE in 2008 would earn about 15 cents per kilowatt-hour on a summer weekday, while a system generating power from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. (such as a solar power system), would earn about 22 cents per kilowatt-hour under the same circumstances. Overall, the tariffs range from 8 to 31 cents per kilowatt-hour. Facilities earning the tariff cannot be participating in other state incentive programs.
Feed-in tariffs have been used in other countries, such as Germany, to encourage a rapid growth in customer-located renewable energy systems, but the CPUC has set limits on the current tariffs. For systems at public water and wastewater facilities, the statewide capacity limit is set at 250 megawatts and is distributed among the seven utilities according to their size. For other customer-located facilities, the capacity limit is about 104.6 megawatts for PG&E and for SCE, about 123.8 megawatts. PG&E, SCE, and some of the other utilities offer their tariffs through two options: the customer can sell the utility only their excess power, or they can arrange to sell all the power from their facility to the utility. The new tariffs are effective immediately. See the CPUC order (http://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/Published/Agenda_resolution/78255.htm).
The CPUC also made a change to a program that provides financial rewards to utilities based on the performance of their energy efficiency programs. The program had allowed interim rewards to the utilities, but included a provision that could force a utility to repay the rewards if a review found that the program had fallen short. That provision was discouraging utilities from taking advantage of the program. To address the problem, the CPUC removed the payback provision but also lowered the size of the interim rewards. See the CPUC press release (http://docs.cpuc.ca.gov/PUBLISHED/NEWS_RELEASE/78313.htm).
