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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes - AEC - 01/05/2015 Meeting Minutes Alternative Energy Committee Time: Monday,January 5, 2015 Location:Town Hall Basement Meeting Room Attendees: Alternative Energy Committee Shaun Selha—Co-Chair Marie Caristi-MacDonald—Co-Chair Steve Wenner David Eisenhaure Andrew Muir Mary Jo Larson Patricia Gooding Josiah Stevenson Committee Friends Dave DeGennaro The following items were discussed: 1. Meeting Minutes • Steve Wenner submitted September and October Meeting Minutes in November for Approval. They appear to be the last approved and posted Meeting Minutes (Marie and Steve)to confirm. For November and December Marie will put Shaun's "Meeting Recap" email text on official letterhead for approval and posting. • Josiah Stevenson offered to take Meeting Notes, starting with the January 2015 AEC Meeting, as well and submit a draft of them to Marie and Shaun for review to ensure Shaun's "Meeting Recap" did not miss any pertinent information that needs to be added to the official meeting minutes. 2. Renewable Energy Initiatives • Palmer Capital PV Array Lease Agreement and PPA o Shaun sent reviewed and approved Lease Agreement and PPA to Chris Senior on 12/15/14. Chris forwarded both documents to Town Council for final review and approval. o As part of due diligence and preliminary engineering evaluation, Palmer Capital uncovered a typographical error in the approved Town Meeting Warrant Article record associated with the use of the old landfill for the PV Array project. In that warrant article the old landfill was documented as being on parcel 05-048. In reality the old landfill covers two parcels, which are 05-048 as well as 06- 25B. Although this was a typographical error it has led to a conundrum. The RFP process was for the entire old landfill and the contractors submitted bids for the entire old landfill so there is no need to go back out to bid for the development of parcel 06-25B. The parcel, however, needs to be approved for leasing for the development of a PV array at Town Meeting for official administrative record purposes. If parcel 06-25B cannot be merged seamlessly with 05-048 to form one old landfill parcel,then a Town Meeting warrant article will need to be drafted for the approval of leasing parcel 06-25B for the PV array project. Palmer Capital is currently weighing the option of moving forward with interconnection agreement and engineering analysis "at risk" in order to keep the project on schedule and on track for December 2015 completion. • Eric Seuss to touch base with CDM Smith point of contact to understand what exactly is required for the obtainment of the "Landfill Post-Closure Permit". • Solar City Virtual Net Metering Credit(VNMC)Agreement o Shaun sent reviewed and approved VNMC Agreement to Chris Senior on 12/5/14. Chris forwarded the document to Town Council for final review and approval. Chris to work with Town Council to finalize and execute. 3. Green Communities Certification Initiative • QC#1:Adopt"As-of-Right Siting"— Draft Town Meeting Warrant Article language submitted to Chris Senior as well as Town Council. Language to be finalized and then sent to Planning Board for review and public discussion for inclusion at the Town Meeting. Mary Jo and Marie to follow-up with Town Council to see if any assistance is required to finalize draft. • QC#2:Adopt Expedited Application/Permitting Process(12-month)—Cohasset already satisfies this criteria. No follow-up work required. • QC#3:Establish an Energy Use Baseline With a Plan to Reduce Baseline by 20%in 5 Years— Patricia Gooding has confirmed that MassEnergylnsight Energy Management System has all of the electricity and natural gas data. Patricia has been working with the Town to consolidate and enter the diesel, oil, and vehicle unleaded gas data to the system so the benchmarking can be finalized. With that benchmarking complete we can then construct the plan for energy reduction that will include the Municipal Facility ECM implementation and Streetlight Conversion project. • QC#4:Purchase only Fuel-Efficient Vehicles—Steve Wenner completed the Municipal Vehicle inventory. There are six (6)vehicles that are ruled as "non-exempt" under this qualification criteria. Two (2) are for the Fire Department,two (2)for the School Department, and two (2)for the DPW. Four of the six vehicles are less than 10 years old. The vehicles only need to be replaced with fuel-efficient vehicles at the end of their useful lives. No further action needs to be taken • QC#5:Adoption of Stretch Code— DOER forwarded the Town a presentation that reviewed the differences between the Stretch Code and the new MA Building Code (Energy Section). This presentation was reviewed with Bob Egan and he did not see any issues with its adoption. Draft Town Meeting Warrant Article language submitted to Chris Senior as well as Town Council. Language to be finalized and then sent to Planning Board for review and public discussion for inclusion at the Town Meeting. Mary Jo and Marie to follow-up with Town Council to see if any assistance is required to finalize draft. 4. Energy Conservation Measure Implementation • Schools— National Grid approved the ECM reports, incentive amounts, and financial analysis. The School Department has already moved forward with lighting retrofits inside of the schools (will wait on parking lot LED analysis until Town moved forward with Streetlight Conversion). After the lighting retrofit is complete,the variable speed drive installations will begin. • Other Municipal Facilities—Dave DeGennaro noted that he believe that Brian Joyce had received National Grid approval for the other municipal facilities as well but was not sure where the Town was in regards to ECM implementation. Brian Joyce to provide an update. • Streetlight Procurement and Conversion— No further updates were provided this month. Brian Joyce and Chris Senior to provide an update. 5. Miscellaneous New Business 6. • Dave DeGennaro asked the AEC if they would be interested in presenting to the School Committee on Tuesday, 2/3/15 to review the current initiatives being pursued. The AEC agreed to it and suggested also inviting teachers to the meeting. • The next AEC Meeting will be held on Monday, 2/9/15 at 7:30 p.m. in the Town Hall Basement Conference Room. Respectfully submitted, Shaun Selha Alternative Energy Committee