by jboullion | Apr 6, 2009 | Uncategorized
Commentary
by Michael Vickerman, RENEW Wisconsin
April 6, 2009
The average American adult exhibits some proficiency with basic arithmetic–the adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing of numbers. With these tools we are able to calculate a baseball player’s batting average, the amount of interest income earned on a three-month certificate of deposit, the service tip on a $50 dinner, and the duration of a driving trip from Madison to Minneapolis. Very few motorists need a calculator to figure out the total cost of a fill-up when the per-gallon price of gasoline goes up by a dime.
Yet, when the subject turns to America’s energy future, a subject where some facility with number-crunching is essential for understanding the issues at stake, our native competence seems to desert us. How else to explain the preponderance of newspaper articles, radio and television programs and Internet sites that either fumble the numbers that represent reality, or simply ignore them altogether.
If, as participants in a democratic process, we believe in the concept of informed consent, it is incumbent on ourselves to acquire some familiarity with the numbers that matter. Absent a grounding in the realm of quantities, durations and physical properties, public discussions on energy cannot help but devolve into exercises in magical thinking.
Consider a recent article in The New York Times titled “Cost Works Against Alternative and Renewable Energy Sources in Time of Recession.” In that article, reporter Matthew Wald states that solar and wind electric generating capacity sources are more expensive than new coal, natural gas or nuclear power plants. The yardstick Wald uses to compare the cost-effectiveness of different energy sources is their estimated kilowatt-hour cost, which is the same measure used to calculate the monthly electric bill.
However, Wald makes no mention of the size of the generating stations that are being compared, a critical omission. Coal and gas are relatively inexpensive fuels if an electric utility is looking to build one large power plant, say, 500 megawatts (MW). But what if the utility only needs 100 MW of additional capacity? In those situations, the large size of a typical coal plant becomes an economic liability, unlike a wind power plant, which can be easily adjusted to fill any gap up to 200 MW.
This isn’t rocket science, just simple math. Even if a kilowatt-hour (kWh) generated at new wind power plant costs 40% more than one produced by a new coal plant four times the size, the wind project will put less pressure on electric rates because the utility spent less money overall to build it. This is an important benefit from relying on a resource that comes in multiples of 2 MW increments instead of one 500 MW unit.
In this era of trillion-dollar bailouts, it is impossible to overstate the risk of building too much capacity that’s not needed. Utility loads have leveled off in the last nine months, caused by the economic contraction that has wreaked havoc in the industrial sector. In some utility territories with large industrial loads, the demand for electricity is falling. Indeed, the recent shutdowns of the General Motors plant in Janesville and the Domtar paper mill in Wisconsin Rapids are certain to depress this year’s sales at Alliant Energy’s Wisconsin utility below last year’s totals.
Given the above, one has to wonder if Alliant is still disappointed with the Public Service Commission’s decision in late 2008 not to let it build a new coal-fired plant in southwest Wisconsin. I dare say it would not have been possible to amortize the $2 billion project over a shrinking revenue base without asking for permission to raise rates. Perhaps Alliant will thank the agency later for stopping this undertaking before ground was broken. But perhaps I have too rich a fantasy life.
The Commission’s rejection of Alliant’s Nelson Dewey 3 project demonstrated the value of asking questions and burrowing into the quantitative details of a particular issue. Instead of simply accepting Alliant’s representations at face value, the agency challenged the underlying assumptions and studied alternative resource acquisition scenarios that were at least as plausible and certainly less expensive than what the utility wanted to pursue. As a result of the agency’s inquiries and the decision it reached, it’s fair to say that adding new central station generators is the furthest thing from a Wisconsin utility’s mind right now.
That Alliant’s ratepayers would be vulnerable to a carbon tax or a ceiling on carbon dioxide emissions also figured prominently in the Commission’s decision-making calculus. Though electric utilities can legally discharge CO2 into the atmosphere and not suffer any economic penalty for it, the agency was not willing to assume that such an arrangement will last in perpetuity. Avoiding a substantial downstream liability is a cost individuals and companies routinely absorb today as long as it is labeled “insurance.”
In contrast, Wald’s article assumes that the future will follow the trajectory of the immediate past. The reporter never tested his assumptions on future load growth, environmental regulation, financial risks and fuel prices, nor did he present any other arguments for increasing renewable energy production besides the environmental ones.
For example, one searches in vain for any reference to the financial risks avoided by pursuing zero-fuel cost resources that do not deplete over time. Compared with coal, nuclear and even natural gas, solar and wind energy are the energy world’s equivalent of Treasury bills—a safe haven offering steady and reliable returns. Much recent economic carnage would have been avoided if the trillions of dollars that were heedlessly plowed into McMansions and zero-interest car loans had been redirected instead into renewable energy production.
Another issue unaddressed in Wald’s article is job creation. Part of the reason renewable energy costs more is that the labor comprises a larger share of the expense. The economies of scale that come with central station generation results in fewer job-hours per kWh generated. Nations like Germany, however, have deliberately tailored their energy policies to support solar electric, community-scale wind power and on-farm methane digesters. For what reason, one may ask? To build up a renewable energy economy employing hundreds of thousands of people.
Last week, over 600 people, many of them small manufacturers and commodity suppliers, crowded into a hotel ballroom in Appleton to take part in a one-day seminar on the wind energy supply chain. The turnout surpassed the seminar organizers’ most optimistic expectations. What were the attendees looking for? A chance to establish a business relationship with an industry with reasonable prospects for long-term vitality, in contrast to the automobile sector.
All these lines of inquiry and avenues of research could have been explored in the course of writing this article. Instead of digging into the details and doing the math, Wald chose to skim along the surface and frame this story around the talking points that were prevalent 10 years ago. The result is stale journalism that neither enlightens or edifies. No wonder the print journalism industry is losing money hand over fist—they can’t seem to do the math.
Sources:
“Cost Works Against Alternative and Renewable Energy Sources in Time of Recession.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/29/business/energy-environment/29renew.html?_r=3&ref=business
“The Gray Lady Stumbles Over Wind Facts”
http://www.awea.org/blog/?mode=viewdate&date_no=1&month_no=4&year=2009
“Wisconsin Gov. Doyle Talks Up Wind at Workshop”
http://www.awea.org/blog/?mode=viewdate&date_no=31&month_no=3&year=2009
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Michael Vickerman is executive director of RENEW Wisconsin, a sustainable energy advocacy organization. For more information on the global and national petroleum and natural gas supply picture, visit “The End of Cheap Oil” section in RENEW Wisconsin’s web site: www.renewwisconsin.org. These commentaries also posted on RENEW’s blog: http://renewenergyblog.wordpress.com and Madison Peak Oil Group’s blog: http://www.madisonpeakoil-blog.blogspot.com
by jboullion | Aug 8, 2008 | Uncategorized
BEFORE THE
PUBLIC SERVICE COMMISSION OF WISCONSIN
Application of Wisconsin Power and Light Company
For Authority to Adjust Electric and Natural Gas
Docket No. 6680-UR-116 Rates
DIRECT TESTIMONY OF MICHAEL J. VICKERMAN
ON BEHALF OF RENEW WISCONSIN
Q. What is the purpose of your testimony?
A. The purpose of my testimony is to discuss the company’s proposed solar, wind and biogas energy buyback rates in the context of promoting customer-sited renewable generation facilities. Wisconsin Power & Light (WPL) proposes to acquire wind- and biogas-generated electricity at a price of 9.2 cents/kWh fixed over 10 years and solar electricity at a price of 25 cents/kWh fixed over the same duration.
Q. What are the estimated production costs for biogas and wind energy systems above 20 kW?
A. The data from Focus on Energy-funded wind and biogas energy systems in the past two years give us a clear picture of production costs. For biogas systems up to 500 kW installed this year, the break-even number is now 11 cents/kWh. Between 500 kW and one MW, the system cost drops to 10 cents/kWh. With respect to wind energy installations up to 100 kW, the break-even cost ranges from 18 to 25 cents/kWh range. For a 900 kW wind energy system, the production cost drops to 14 cents per kWh. These estimates are exclusive of federal renewable energy tax credits.
Q. Do you believe that the proposed tariffs will lead to the additional supplies of renewable distributed generation serving WPL?
A. At 9.2 cents, the biogas rate could result in new installations at dairy farms or food processing facilities, but only if the developer succeeds in attracting enough external funding from federal and state sources to cover the difference. Without a U.S.D.A Section 9006 grant or a Focus on Energy incentive in hand, the proposed rate is not likely to amortize a new 500 kW installation over its term.
As for the proposed wind tariff, I am skeptical that it could provide sufficient stimulus for leveraging independently owned installations, even with external funding. The gap between the rate and the system’s production costs is simply too great. It would take either exceptional fundraising talent on the part of the prospective wind turbine owner or a significant disinterest in cash flow to go forward with an installation through the tariff as proposed.
Q. Do you support WPL’s proposed solar electric buyback rate?
A. Yes I do. If approved WPL’s proposed solar tariff will spur additional installations in its territory, which help the utility manage its peak loads more effectively. Certainly that has been the experience with We Energies (WE) and Madison Gas & Electric (MGE). Customer installations of solar electric systems have increased dramatically in both WE and MGE territory since the utilities began offering solar specific rates. WE’s 22.5 cents/kWh rate took effect in January 2006, while MGE’s 25 cents/kWh hit the streets in January this year. The amount of solar electric capacity leveraged by WE’s solar rate is in the neighborhood of 600 kW. At MGE, about 200 kW of solar capacity has been applied for. Relative to other utilities, WE and MGE are attracting a disproportionate share of Wisconsin’s solar electric installations, a phenomenon that can only be explained by their solar buyback rates.
Q. Does the proposed solar tariff fit your definition of an Advanced Renewable Tariff?
A. It does in every way except for the price. Like a true Advanced Renewable Tariff, it is a fixed offering over a specified period of time that does not increase with higher retail rates. The solar tariff is certainly not based on utility avoided costs. However, it is not, by itself, high enough to capture the production costs of a typical photovoltaic installation. According to data gathered from Focus on Energy-funded PV installations, the tariff would have to be at least double that amount in order for the system owner to recoup the investment over a 10-year period. However, that estimate does not factor in the effect of federal tax credits, Focus on Energy incentives, or accelerated depreciation. When those external economic benefits are added on top of WPL’s proposed buyback rate, the overall package starts to approach the break-even point over a 10-year period, especially for larger-scale systems serving for-profit customers.
Q. Is there a need for additional information on WPL’s renewable energy tariffs?
A. Yes. WPL has not indicated whether it will consider money paid to its renewable energy-producing customers as taxable income. With respect to those customer-generators that currently provide electricity to WPL under the utility’s net energy billing tariff, the utility has a policy of disclosing to the Internal Revenue Service any payments made to those customers. Customers who receive a Form 1099-MISC from WPL are legally obligated to include those payments as part of their taxable income. But not all utilities report these payments to the Internal Revenue Service. Those that don’t include WE, MGE, and Wisconsin Public Service (WPS). If WPL intends to send 1099-MISC forms to its renewable energy-producing customers, it should disclose that that information in the tariff language. I can easily imagine the irritation customer-generator would experience when he or she learns that their return on investment is suddenly subject to federal and state taxes. An even better approach would be to discontinue that practice. Judging from the prevailing practice at WE, MGE and WPS, there appears to be no need for WPL to penalize its customer-generators in this fashion.
Q. Does this complete your direct testimony?
A. Yes, it does.
by jboullion | Jul 10, 2008 | Uncategorized
An Open Letter to Congress
By Michael Vickerman, RENEW Wisconsin
July 10, 2008
If you want to know more about the economic, environmental and security benefits from renewable energy development, look no further than my house in Madison, Wisconsin. A crew from a local solar contractor just finished installing a solar electric system that will, when activated, produce about one-half of the electricity used in our household.
Our desire to turn sunshine into electricity at home generated a tidy revenue stream for the installation contractor, Full Spectrum Solar. Most solar installers in Wisconsin are small businesses that provide their employees with a living wage and a good benefits package. If there is any one economic sector that has kept the U.S. economy from turning into a basket case, it is small business.
The kilowatt-hours generated by our panels will spare Madison Gas and Electric (MGE) from having to produce a like amount, mostly from natural gas. Wellhead natural gas prices have doubled in the last 12 months, driving up the cost of serving peak loads on summer afternoons. But that also is when solar systems are generating close to their rated capacity.
Because solar displaces the highest-cost resources on the electric grid, utilities are becoming increasingly receptive to buying back the solar electricity produced by their customers. From MGE’s perspective, our installation couldn’t happen soon enough. The price MGE is willing to pay for our system’s output, 25 cents per kilowatt-hour fixed over a 10-year period, is almost double its standard retail electric rate. MGE’s solar offer is a voluntary initiative underwritten by more than 10,000 customers who purchase utility-supplied renewable electricity for a small premium.
Clearly, both MGE and its customers believe strongly that solar energy is worth investing in today. Not tomorrow, not next week, today.
Indeed, there is no energy source as local as the sunlight striking the roof over your head. Solar energy is as reliable and predictable as the dawn. Fossil fuels are not needed to deliver the sunlight to the Earth’s surface. If solar energy comes with the territory we inhabit, why not use it?
Moreover, sunshine is not depleted when it’s converted into electricity or heat, nor does the conversion process change the chemical content of the atmosphere. Contrast that with carbon-rich fossil fuels. When a primary fuel like coal is converted into electricity, carbon dioxide is created and released into the environment. The carbon content in the atmosphere is now about one-third higher than it was a century ago, when the Automobile Era and the Age of Electricity were in their infancy. Most of that increase is attributable to fossil fuel combustion.
However useful the electricity may have been to its users, its creation resulted in the permanent removal of coal from the Earth’s crust and higher atmospheric concentrations of CO2 that will last throughout the century. Furthermore, the waste energy discharged through automobile tailpipes and utility smokestacks can’t be turned into oil and coal again. We only get one go-round with fossil fuels.
Used judiciously, solar energy in all its manifestations can help America ease off of its unhealthy and financially burdensome dependence on fossil fuels. Moreover, it is inflation-proof, because the sunlight that strikes the panels doesn’t come with a price tag. Compared with other generation sources, solar energy is virtually maintenance-free.
In one fell swoop, expanding renewable energy’s share of the nation’s energy mix would reduce pollution and greenhouse gas emissions, lower the trade deficit, dampen rising fossil fuel prices, employ hundreds of thousands of people in manufacturing and skilled trades, and extend the available life of the world’s remaining nonrenewable resources. Is there a more effective pathway available to re-energize the nation’s slumping economy and sustain it over the long haul? Not as far as I can tell.
As you very well know, federal tax credits have been the principal policy tool for accelerating renewable energy development in this country. Right now, most renewable energy technologies are more expensive than fossil fuels, but the federal incentives level the economic playing field, providing breathing room for solar, wind and biogas to mature and become cost-competitive with more established energy resources. This has been especially true with wind generation, which has expanded from 6,500 megawatts in January 2005 to over 19,000 today. This tripling of windpower capacity in less than four years could not have happened without the production tax credit being in place during that time.
Here in Wisconsin, the renewable energy marketplace has exploded over the last three years, especially in the solar arena. As of this moment, there are 73 full-service solar electric and solar hot water installation firms active in Wisconsin, more than double the installer base in 2005. While a handful have been around before 2000, most are new entrants into this field. The contractor who installed our solar electric system, Full Spectrum Solar, has seen its revenues increase sevenfold since 2005, when it was established with two co-owners and one employee. That was also the year when Congress established the solar investment tax credit. Now Full Spectrum has 12 full-time employees, five of them hired this year.
How critical is the solar tax credit in driving solar’s growth in the United States? If our middle-class household is at all representative of the solar-installing customer base, I can honestly say that the federal incentive was a necessary component to making that investment work for us. Had federal incentives not been available this year, our budget would have been insufficient to absorb the substantial up-front expense that comes with owning a solar energy system.
Indeed, when I compare the flurry of installation activity now with the near-dormant conditions that prevailed just three years ago, it’s clear that the federal tax credit has greatly expanded the size of the domestic solar energy market.
Bear in mind that there are no other federal policies in place to promote renewable energy development and use. While other nations have adopted different mechanisms“CO2 limits, carbon taxes and feed laws, for example—to nurture this sector, renewable energy policy support in the United States begins and ends with tax credits. Allow them to expire and the safety net underneath renewables disappears with it.
The current cycle of tax credits for wind, solar and biogas will expire January 1, 2009, less than six months from now. Considering how important renewable energy has become for our nation’s environmental health and economic well-being, a citizen could be forgiven for thinking that extending renewable energy credits would be something of a no-brainer for Congress. But despite repeated attempts to extend them, Congress has not yet found a legislative formula that clears a path through the forest of interest groups and narrow partisan agendas standing in the way of timely passage.
Anxiety is growing in the renewable energy world that Congress could very well fumble away its remaining chances to adopt the necessary extension language. Should that happen, the momentum built up over the last three years will dissipate next year, and potentially throw the solar, wind and biogas industries into reverse.
This is no idle fear. Congress waited until October 2004 to extend the renewable enegry incentives that expired January 1st that year. The commercial wind industry ground to a virtual standstill that year and didn’t bounce back until the next year. Plans by overseas wind turbine manufacturers to build up a U.S.-based supply chain were put on hold as demand for commercial turbines sagged. Even though the wind industry has been on a roll over the last three-and-a-half years, memories of the 2004 bust continue to inhibit development of a U.S. manufacturing presence.
Should Congress fail to take action this year, the effects will be even more devastating than in 2004. This time around the entire solar industry“installers, equipment manufacturers, and third-party system owners“will experience a taste of what the wind industry went through before. So, too, will those companies—system designers, general constractors, civil construction companies, component manufacturers and environmental consulting firms“that have recently found a protfitable niche in the expanding renewable energy world. The ripple effect from a lapse in federal policy support, however temporary, will be felt by a wider circle of market actors, including utilities.
And who are some of these market actors? What follows is a partial list, by no means complete, of Wisconsin companies that have a stake in this country’s renewable energy future: GDH, Inc. (Chilton), Pieper Power/Clear Horizons LLC (Milwaukee), Johnson Controls (Milwaukee), H&H Solar Services (Madison), EcoEnergy (Madison), RMT WindConnect (Madison), Lake Michigan Wind and Sun (Sturgeon Bay), Bassett Mechanical (Kaukauna), Paterson Solar (Bayfield), Manitowoc Cos. (Manitowoc), Green Sky Energetics (Manitowoc), Tower Tech (Manitowoc), Magnetek (Menomonee Falls), Bubbling Springs Solar (Menomonie), Oscar Boldt Construction (Appleton), Orion Construction Group (Appleton), Timmerman’s Talents (Platteville), Wausaukee Composites (Wausaukee and Cuba City), Cardinal Solar (Sun Prairie), Badger Transport (Clintonville), Mitchell’s Heating and Cooling (Waupaca), Energy Concepts (Hudson), and Chet’s Plumbing and Heating (Stevens Point).
Extending the renewable energy tax credits would cost U.S. taxpayers somewhere between $3 and $4 billion a year, most of it going to wind generation. Some members of Congress consider that an unacceptably large expense. But these are not permanent incentives. In the case of windpower installations, which have a book life between 20 and 30 years, federal tax credits cover no more than 10 years of operation. After the 10th year, project output is fully taxable.
In my view, this is an underappreciated facet of the tax subsidy argument. Long after the tax credits are exhausted, the wind, solar and biogas installations that were aided by them will still be producing self-replenishing, domestically sourced energy for the owner and/or the grid. Can the same be said for incentives that accelerate the drawdown of our nation’s dwindling supplies of oil and natural gas?
Consider the 33 commercial wind turbines installed Wisconsin in the first half of 1999. Beginning July 2009, their output will be fully subject to federal taxes. These turbines, owned by three different Wisconsin utilities, should generate the same quantity of power in 2010“and 2025“as they did in the year 2000. Seen in that light, the tax break that leveraged the existence of those wind turbines is, if anything, a bargain, one whose benefits to our energy future appreciates over time. Shouldn’t that be a guiding principle in formulating national energy policy?
An annual price tag of $4 billion is peanuts compared with the $1.3 billion that leaves this country each day to slake our nation’s seemingly uncontrollable thirst for petroleum. Here’s another metric for comparing the cost of renewable energy incentives: at current rates of spending, the ongoing occupation of Iraq goes through $4 billion in less than 12 days. And one can argue that the pittance that U.S. taxpayers have contributed thus far to support domestic renewable energy sources has produced far better results in the areas of energy security and economic development than the ongoing occupation of Iraq.
But it’s a telling measure of Beltway cluelessness that our federal lawmakers are more willing to make a show of fiscal discipline on renewable energy policy than on an overseas military operation that now drains about $120 billion a year from the U.S. Treasury.
The U.S. economy is on the ropes, and a lot of unpleasant policy trade-offs lie ahead. As the cost of fossil fuels escalate, and the housing sector and the automobile industry contract further, the U.S. can ill afford to skimp on the one energy pathway that can, with the proper policy support, create jobs by the thousands and convert capital into socially productive and sustainable enterprises. If Congress is truly serious about turning the economy around, reducing the trade deficit, making progress on climate change, and creating a more energy-secure America, it must extend the renewable energy tax incentives, preferably this month. No other action will accomplish so much, or cost so little.
Michael Vickerman
Executive Director
RENEW Wisconsin
222 S. Hamilton St.
Madison, WI 53703
www.renewwisconsin.org
