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]]>Climate Impact Capital spun out Climate Impact Capital Energy Holdings, LLC (CIC Energy) in 2021 to address significant gaps in U.S. energy workforce and critical infrastructure development. CIC Energy serves two segments by addressing the I. demand for energy (e.g. cost-effective electricity, equitable energy, demand response programs, backup power) and lack of supply of human resources with technical and trade skills.
CIC Energy will deploy Phase 1 winnings and fuel Team Impact with funding and technical support provided by the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Community Power Accelerator (CPA) Prize. With almost 200 teams, judges at SETO and NREL were challenged to pick the Top 25 amongst a critical mass of competitors. The $10 million prize competition is a three-phase process to increase the number of equitable community solar projects by providing funding and resources for developers and co-developers throughout the project lifecycle. By the end of the prize, competitors will be ready to engage with the Community Power Accelerator online platform, which provides a place for competitors to showcase their credit-ready projects to verified project developers, investors, and philanthropic organizations.
CIC Energy is excited to cultivate community solar designed to support equitable energy jobs and accelerate critical infrastructure workforce development. Through CPA’s online portal and CIC Energy’s Learning and Earning in Energy Platform (LEEP), prosumers are enabled with democratized, decentralized and digital disruptors to monetize savings, enhance human behavior and offer credit-ready solar to stabilize power grids and add resilience to communities—with a priority placed on projects that benefit underserved communities—and connect them with mission-aligned investors and philanthropic organizations to get funding in Port Arthur, Central and East TX in 2023.
Community Solar Benefits
In Phase 2, CIC Energy will further develop community grids, equitable and distributed energy models, and deploy a series of up to 1MW DC projects within communities, offering a range of meaningful impacts in Port Arthur, Northwest Houston, Central and East Texas. Community solar offers direct benefits to the community by reducing energy costs, expanding renewable energy consumption, and providing solar industry workforce development opportunities. Project Renew has prioritized disadvantaged communities since launching its first Solar Apprenticeship Program at Del Valle Opportunity Center in Fall 2021. Team Impact will catalyze change in households, creating home energy systems for community solar subscribers, bolstering community grid resilience, facilitating community ownership of project assets, and supporting equitable workforce development by providing high-wage opportunities that reduce income disparities across demographic groups.
Team Impact
CIC Energy, along with the Houston Advanced Resource Center (HARC), Community In-Power and Development Association, Inc. (CIDA), Mills Agriculture & Renewable Energy, LLC (MARE), and the Center for Sustainable Communities (CSC), make up Team Impact. Our Impact aims to modernize community grids and increase solar workforce capacity within historically underserved communities by developing a community solar portfolio in Port Arthur, Texas.
Community Solar Builds Alliances, Creates Greener and More Resilient Grids in Port Arthur
Team Impact’s community solar projects in Port Arthur will target schools, churches, and small businesses within disadvantaged residential communities, delivering power grid resilience during energy emergencies and showcasing the cost benefits of distributed energy systems. The end goal is the expansion of community solar benefits to household subscribers. Local community members will have ownership of these projects, democratizing energy production in the city.
Increasing Energy Security and Mission Critical Communications
Community solar electricity rates will be lower than rates available via existing power distribution grids, which reduces the financial burden of electricity usage and increases energy security by improving grid resilience. Residents previously forced to ration energy usage due to economic hardship (e.g. by not using their air conditioners or setting thermostats to dangerously high temperatures) will be able to reduce energy rationing with more affordable electricity rates provided by community solar projects. Such benefits will improve the quality of life for residents of disadvantaged communities in Port Arthur.
Gearing up for Phase 2
Winning Phase 1 of the Community Power Accelerator Prize is an exciting opportunity for CIC Energy to bring alternative energy to Texas residents facing high energy burdens and frequent power outages. In decreasing energy costs and enhancing grid resilience in the community, CIC Energy will deliver energy equity and create more lucrative employment opportunities for this underserved community. As we begin Phase 2 of the prize, we look forward to realizing our plan and are committed to providing clean energy access to the disadvantaged neighborhoods of Port Arthur, Texas.
Accelerating Equitable Energy Through Federal Funding and Team Impact
The American-Made Solar Prize is directed and administered by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory and is funded by the U.S. Department of Energy Solar Energy Technologies Office. CIC Energy applauds the efforts of our government to prioritize energy equality.
CIC Energy: An Impact Driven Change Agent to fuel Renewable Microgrid Deployment, Disruptive Grid Service Models and Activate a Critical Infrastructure Workforce
Climate Impact Capital Energy Holdings, LLC (CIC Energy) develops and manages alternative energy and power generation for commercial, municipal, and government solar power and energy storage facilities.
As an integrated service provider, we identify the most effective set of asset solutions for our clients considering cost and resiliency goals. In addition to deploying solar and storage, our services and solutions include electric vehicle charging, building energy management services, and grid services.
CIC Energy also manages the development and implementation of an integrated training, certification, and continued education platform to provide Registered Apprentices for our government/corporate partners and enable our planned integrated solar, storage, EV, and microgrid projects. Stay tuned for details regarding our Learning and Earning in Energy Platform (LEEP).
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]]>by Eugene Han and Alex Rozenfeld
Modernizing Texas’ power grid will stimulate jobs and resilience. The time is right to look at ways of cultivating robust power sources that can withstand both pandemics and climate events.
Throughout history, civilizations have seen pandemics as mechanisms for innovation to support the future well-being of their people. In the 19th century, multiple cholera epidemics broke out in New York, causing traffic jams of horses and carriages as people fled for the perceived safety of the suburbs. These outbreaks resulted in the building of underground wastewater systems and green spaces like New York City’s Central Park to make the city more livable and healthy. Covid-19 may have similar effects in Texas and larger urban metropolitan areas around the world.
In Texas, we are now seeing the first glimpse of Covid-19’s impact on the state’s legendary sprawl. Early evidence shows that Covid-19 lifestyle changes may reverse the two-decade-long national trend of people moving back to cities. This would undermine efforts to increase urban energy efficiency and the implementation of so-called “smart” cities, that seamlessly integrate energy management, transportation and social services. It also highlights the need to modernize already strained suburban power grids across Texas.
Texas is among the nation’s hottest and mostly energy deregulated states. Texas’ unwieldy urban sprawl is seen in some of America’s fastest-growing cities: Houston, Dallas, and San Antonio. The Texas Triangle, as it is known, is home to more than 18 million residents. From 2010 to 2018, the state’s metropolitan areas were the only places in the U.S. to have added more than 1 million people.
This rapid growth, combined with record heat waves and droughts, has often strained Texas’ electrical power reserve, which faces even more demand if Texans shift in a permanent way to working from home and if the record summer heat waves intensify. With these changes may also come a future decrease in power reliability, impacting businesses and employees working from home.
These important changes in energy demand emphasize the need to modernize the aging networks of power grids across Texas. The good news is that Covid-19 offers the opportunity for a fresh look at how the state organizes its energy infrastructure. The hope would be that the future would bring greater focus on distributed energy resources, which can provide robust and resilient power capable of coping with both the pandemic and Hurricane Harvey-type climate events.
Modernizing Texas’ power grid will also help fill a growing employment void created by the depressed state of Texas’ fossil fuel industry, which has seen thousands of jobs lost since the pandemic began. Texas is already home to more than 263,000 power grid workers. Pandemic or no, jobs in the energy sector are expected to grow. Between 2015 and the end of 2019, electric power generation added 177,000 jobs, energy infrastructure created 156,000, and energy efficiency an impressive 400,000, according to a report by Steven Pedigo Director at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs LBJ Urban Lab.
In the short term, the health needs caused by the pandemic are paramount. But we must also look to the future and be sure to facilitate an economic recovery. By embarking on a smarter and less carbon-reliant energy future, Texas has the chance to serve as a future model for supporting the health and safety of its citizens and its economy.
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]]>Texas oil and gas companies are experiencing their most dire crisis ever. As countries have shuttered and industries slow from COVID-19, demand for oil and gas has plunged while supply from OPEC, Russia, and the United States continues to rise. Oil usually hovers around $40-$60 a barrel, but during this pandemic, prices are struggling to stay above $20. For some, the crash of the fossil fuel energy industry is a reason to celebrate. Such celebrations by the “oil is our enemy” crowd are premature. In fact, this crisis may become a huge setback for renewables and the energy transition for four important reasons.
1. Low oil prices will lead to bankruptcies and a lack of transparency
Oil companies going bankrupt does not mean they disappear, magically replaced by carbon-free alternatives. Quite the opposite: Bankrupt energy companies will drop from public markets, and the transparency that comes with public listings, undoing years of effort to make oil companies more publicly accountable about their activities. If sold to private equity firms, there is minimal environmental oversight, with no need (or interest) to maintain transparency and environmental risk management. In the unlikely case that companies shut down altogether, any future supply will come from countries with questionable accountability and transparency processes. This is important because much of the ESG (environmental, social, governance) progress, thus far, is due to shareholder resolutions requiring transparency for public companies, including the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures. Since 2015, the TCFD has created a framework for companies to signal changes, to report impact, and to publicize their plans to reduce GHGs. The gains from forced transparency have been substantial. Bankruptcies would destroy these initiatives.
2. Low oil prices mean low natural gas prices
Natural gas prices have been this low only twice in 20 years, in 1999 and 2016. Low natural gas prices make power cheaper to generate, helping many gas-to-power producers in the short-term and increasing the likelihood of new natural gas plant development. Now, we prefer gas to coal, and the good news is the pandemic has also seen a significant reduction in coal use globally. However, the more use of natural gas, the less incentive to transition to alternative forms of energy.
3. Low oil prices lead to cuts in renewable initiatives
Investment in novel carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) could be drastically reduced. CCUS investment was already low within the oil and gas industry. Now it’s taking a back burner to survival. We already see significantly less interest in, and ability by the industry, to invest in these areas from their innovation and R&D budgets. Even if bankruptcy is avoided, capital budgets will continue to be reduced, impacting any renewable initiatives and low-carbon programs planned for the next few years.
4. Low oil prices change our mobility choices
Shifting the focus to the consumer, prices at the pump are at record lows. This does not bode well for electric vehicles. When we all start driving again, there will be far more incentives to both drive more and to buy low fuel efficiency trucks, rather than fuel-efficient EVs or hybrids.
Ironically, stability is key
The collapse of fossil energy prices highlights a key paradox that threatens the movement to renewable energy. Swings in commodity prices and fossil fuel bankruptcies hinder the path to an energy transition. If we want to maintain our low-carbon energy targets and a successful energy transition, the global economy and domestic oil (especially gas) must recover. For this to happen and for renewables to win long-term, oil has to survive first.
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]]>Let me start 2020 with a confession: I’m not a Texan, but I got here as fast as I could. Why, though? What’s so special about this state? Historically, people flocked to Texas to take advantage of its resources, which spurred three big Texas industries: ranching, oil, and real estate. More recently, it has become known for its affordable cost-of-living, business-friendly policies, and of course, as the epicenter of the shale oil & gas revolution.
Texas is the self-proclaimed oil & gas capital of the United States, producing more than a third of the nation’s crude oil, a quarter of its natural gas, and a significant fraction of its liquified natural gas (LNG) export capacity.
However, with the energy transition underway, we now also believe we can become the low-carbon energy capital, with an emerging landscape that both decarbonizes and goes beyond fossil fuels. Given Texas’s 25,000 megawatts (MW) installed wind capacity (nearly 5x that of California), and its 3,400 MW installed solar capacity (still behind California’s 26,000 MW, but getting closer each year), Texas is well-poised to be the frontline of all things energy for the foreseeable future.
And in case you forgot, Texas is a historically red (purple, at best) political state. Combining the very conservative rural areas, which embrace both wind farms and fracking, and liberal urban cities with ambitious climate action and renewable energy targets, we have very diverse viewpoints.
To me, that means this state has the potential to make the largest impact on the future of energy and climate change in the USA, and the world. Whether through reducing emissions from big oil, developing clean energy projects, or growing an energy startup, Texas is THE place to be.
Each month, we will explore a business climate change topic in Texas, looking at views from all perspectives. We’ll let you know how what’s going on in the Lone Star State is relevant to you and to the global energy community.
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