Sunrise

I love my new job working as a solar energy system installer completing (with a little help from my friends) my first project this week! An Atlanta homeowner now has both hot water and electricity courtesy of old Sol.

The new photovoltaic system has 14 roof-mounted panels which are connected via a voltage inverter to the house's electrical system. This is a netmetering device, which means that the homeowner continues to purchase electricity from the local electric utility. The panels generate clean, no-cost electricity that displaces an equivalent amount of dirty electricity that the homeowner would otherwise have purchased from the electric utility company. At any given moment when the solar panels are producing more than the homeowner can consume, the extra electricity flows out to the utility grid, and the home owner's electric meter will run backwards!

The new solar thermal system has two panels on the roof filled with thin tubing that uses the sun's energy to heat a glycol fluid the same way a garden hose left out in the sun heats water. Our system pumps the glycol, which can reach temperatures of over 220 degrees Fahrenheit, through a pipe to a heat exchanger in the basement where it produces hot water.

The hot water then flows into an insulated storage tank until needed. Much like a conventional water heater, this tank contains an electrical heating element to boost the water temperature whenever the available sunlight cannot satisfy all the homeowner's needs.

The finished project is pictured here. The homeowner intends to remove some or all of the tree so that the panels are not shaded.

My job is to help people and organizations satisfy their energy needs using economical, environmentally-sound solar technologies. This week I worked on my customer's roof installing the panels, feeling the sun's intense warmth and an urgency to do more to capture it for our benefit.

I love this work!

Oh, Stimulus!

On Friday, I attended a Sustainable Atlanta Roundtable titled, Show Me the Energy Dollars: New financial incentives and policies for energy efficiency and solar energy resources. These monthly SARTs are usually very good, and July's was no exception. An overflow audience consisted mainly of public and private organizations seeking access to Federal funds and of contractors and suppliers eager to support the ensuing projects.

David Gipson of the Georgia Environmental Facilities Authority (GEFA) said that the U.S. Department of Energy has approved GEFA's plan to use $82.5 million of Federal stimulus (aka, American Recovery and Reinvestment Act ARRA) funding for statewide energy efficiency and renewable energy projects and $124.8 million for low-income home weatherization. GEFA is now responsible for administering the $82.5 million State Energy Program (SEP) and will release guidance and application forms for SEP programs “shortly.”

Gipson described eight different programs and grants that will be available under the SEP. Most of the SEP's $82.5 million will be applied to one program aimed at retrofitting state government facilities.

Of the remaining SEP programs, I was personally interested to learn more about the Clean Energy Property Rebate (GA HB 473.) This provides grants that will offset 35 percent of the cost of renewable energy equipment, up to a cap that varies by technology. Funding will be awarded on a first come-first served basis for projects that have been installed in the same year for which funding has been applied.

What's really cool is that this grant will not replace the existing state income tax credit that will continue to be offered to residential and non-residential applicants. Unlike existing tax credits, this rebate program can be used by nonprofit organizations, schools and churches, which was welcome news to the many Georgia Interfaith Power and Light representatives in the audience.

For renewable energy projects including solar, the Feds are removing the caps that currently apply to the 30% Federal Income Tax Credit. Gipson said that GEFA is also instituting a reservation of credit program, which removes some of the financial risk when applying for project financing.

An audience member asked for clarification about the types of renewable energy projects covered by these SEP plans, since they only mentioned wind and solar technologies. He was disappointed to learn from Gipson that biomass projects may be added “at a later date.” Upon visiting the DOE's web site, I see that biomass is covered under the Renewable Energy Grants program, which will pay up to 30 percent of the project's cost for large, visible and “shovel-ready” projects.

These grants offer project developers the option of taking tax grants in lieu of tax credits, which became less useful when the current economic downturn shrank tax liabilities and tight credit made it difficult, if not impossible, to secure financing.

Gipson also told us that:

• There is no need to “get in line” for ARRA energy funds that will be administered by GEFA, because all funding will be awarded based on a competitive application process.
• The competitive application process will begin after the DOE awards the ARRA funds to GEFA, probably during the week of July 12, 2009.
• GEFA still needs to develop its competitive application process and the criteria that will be used to evaluate applications.

During the Q&A session, many heads in the room nodded when an audience member mentioned that large renewable energy projects will not be planned in Georgia until PPA providers find a more conducive business environment here. Dave agreed but said that GEFA does not have a plan for addressing this. He said that the Georgia PSC and perhaps the Georgia Power Company needs to address this matter.

I recently discussed this with a friend of mine who works at Georgia Power. My friend said that the PSC is largely responsible for Georgia Power's delay in expanding its existing net metering tariff.

Specifically, the PSC needs to update the formula it uses to compute how much GP pays independent power producers, and this is an issue that the utilities and the solar industry can get behind, together. I am sure that we will also address this within the Georgia Solar Energy Association.

As more information becomes available, GEFA will post it on their ARRA Energy Information web page where you can also sign up for their ARRA energy programs email list.

A ripping good storm

Throughout yesterday evening, a succession of severe thunderstorms hit Atlanta. I drove home from dinner in Decatur amidst flooded roadways, the surging water forming vortices around low-lying storm drains. The torrent covered the street in front of my house from curb-to-curb, sweeping away bags of yard waste and splashing hard against parked cars.The Atlanta Journal-Constitution published an amazing photograph of lightning striking the SunTrust building — as seen from Irwin Street near Boulevard. Despite what their caption reads, I think the lightning is shown striking the Omni Hotel, not the SunTrust building.

Ryan Leech is my hero.

Mountain biking fans know Ryan Leech as a foremost innovator of trials riding, the sport of bicycle-based acrobatics. Leech's work has been featured in dozens of mountain biking movies and live competitions, where he negotiates unimaginably-difficult jumps and obstacles using his trademark combination of power, grace and imagination.

As much as I enjoy watching him in action, this does not make him a hero. He became my hero after I read Mountainbike magazine's June issue, with an inspiring story about how a professional mountain biker becomes a global citizen.

The article explains how Leech recently had an epiphany while filming a new trials movie in British Columbia that was set in an old-growth forest soon to be logged. Leech was struck both by the forest's majesty and by the sense of impending loss, realizing that he would be one of the last to enjoy the forest once it is clear-cut: for a long, long time.

He determined himself to learn more about it, about logging in BC, about resource extraction in general, and about the environmental movement. He read one of my favorite books, The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight, by Thom Hartmann and hooked up with the David Suzuki Foundation, a very cool nonprofit organization dedicated to educating people about the environment.

For a guy who never graduated from college, Leech hit the books hard and got himself up-to-speed using the same determination and self confidence that makes him a world class mountain biker. I appreciate how he understands himself, his strengths and his limitations, and about his fellow humans.

Leech knows that, as passionate as he is about saving the world, he does not want to simply preach. Instead, he is summoning a skill that few wield more prodigiously: his keen sense of balance. He is searching for the ways to effectively use his sport to deliver his message about the need for us to live more in harmony with nature. He is searching for the best way to entertain, inform and inspire.

Leech is a hero, because he is realizing his true potential not just as a mountain biker but also as a human being, and this gives him a clear idea about how he will make his life truly meaningful.

I wish him godspeed!