Category Archives: Sustainable Energy

Favoring the Sun









Cities, States, Lead the Way









Iceland – Fire and Ice










Wrong Way President











Sustainability is the Future










Hurrah for Clarksville

It’s the (sustainable) economy, stupid.

Intermittency Need Not Be a Problem








Property Assessed Clean Energy Act

Whether you personally are or are not concerned with global warming, you should be interested in saving money. Many steps taken to mitigate climate change such as sustainable energy supplies and energy efficiency save money. The Trump administration refuses to acknowledge the risk of global warming and subsequent climate change, indicated by his refusal to join the rest of the world in the Paris Accords. Regardless, cities, states, schools and universities, even businesses across the country do get it and are acting to honor the goals of the agreement.

Assuming Arkansas is like the rest of the United States, about half of all the energy and three-quarters of the electrical energy used goes into buildings. Acts, ordinances, etc. which lead to increased utilization of non-carbon energy sources can go a long way to save energy, lower costs, and lessen the use of fossil fuels which drive global warming.  Act 1074 of 2013, called the Property Assessed Clean Energy act or PACE is a program that allows a person or business to finance energy projects through the inclusion of the costs in a property tax assessment.

The act enables governments such as cities, counties or combinations thereof to form Energy Districts which organize financing for projects. Fayetteville, (later joined by Springdale,) and North Little Rock have active programs. A property owner/business identifies a project that will save energy or water or create clean renewable energy. The improvement district then arranges the financing for the project. This can be done with bonds or a variety of private financing. The property owner repays the loan through a property tax assessment over a defined period of time.

A number of energy efficiency projects come to mind: Increased insulation, more efficient window windows with low-E glass, solar hot water systems, projects which reduce water consumption, more efficient heating and cooling systems such as ground source heat pumps. Projects which actually produce clean energy are also funded: photovoltaic panels, micro-hydro projects, wind turbines and biomass energy are all included.

Here is an example of how it could work. A property owner with an older structure decides to upgrade the HVAC, insulate the walls and attic, and replace the windows. The total cost of the project is 10,000 dollars. She goes the Energy Improvement district and receives 100 percent financing. The cost is repaid over ten years through a property tax assessment. Generally, the savings in utility costs will cover or even exceed the annual fee. If she sells her structure before ten years the buyer assumes the assessment, just as they assume the energy savings from the energy improvement.


Such a program is easily within the reach of Russellville, and other cities which may choose to join the program. The City of Fayetteville created the model ordinance used by the aforementioned cities. Were the program adopted county-wide many farmers or other rural businesses and homes could benefit from energy saving/production.

The best way to save money and the environment comes through energy efficiency. Reduced use of electricity means lower costs but also less burning of coal and natural gas. This is a win, win, win situation. The adoption of ordinance to create an energy district will save the property owners money, create business opportunities and jobs for the community, clean the air, and cool the planet. What’s not to like?

Booming Solar


Sustainable energy is currently the most rapidly expanding form of energy in the United States. The same is true here in Arkansas. Whereas we are not well set for wind as our neighbors are to the west, solar panels (PV) that generate electricity are effective, and getting cheaper by the day. Solar arrays now cost less than half of what they cost just 10 years ago.

The price is now so low as to be competitive with more conventional power sources such as coal and natural gas, and infinitely cleaner. Current solar capacity (as of 2015) is 20.1 megawatts (MW.) This is an unbelievable 640 % increase over all PV power installed up through 2014. The new power installed in 2015 is dominated by utility scale power, 15.4 MW. Commercial industries and businesses installed 0.24 MW and the residential sector 0.46 MW. This represents a 56 million dollar investment in clean energy and jobs.

Solar power has come of age, not just for people wanting a little power for an off-grid cabin in the woods, but residents tied to the grid, industries, and especially power companies. One real advantage of solar power is its scalability. If a power company needs to expand their energy supply a small amount, they can add a small solar field. If they need a lot of power, they install a bigger field. No alternative has this scalability. You just can’t build a (cost effective) small coal or nuclear plant. Not even natural gas fired turbines are as scalable.

The L’Oreal plant in North Little Rock will install several thousand PV panels, about 1 MW’s worth. In March 2016 a private-public consortium consisting of two Arkansas Electric Cooperative Corporations, and Aerojet Rocketdyne will install a 12 MW solar field near East Camden. The largest install this year will be an 81 MW solar farm to be installed by Entergy near Stuttgart.

Generally installs of home solar arrays are booming also. Most cost effective for the consumer is a grid-tied net metered array. This system allows the home owner to remain connected to the grid in addition to the solar panels. When the sun shines the panels provide energy to the house, but when the sun is not shining, the home can draw power from the grid just like any other home.

PV systems can be sized to provide all or any fraction of the power needed for the home. If a particular array actually produces more energy than can be consumed in a given month, the law allows the excess to be carried over to a month when energy is needed.

The consumers gain is however the power companies loss, and they don’t like it. They lose profits by not selling as much electricity and even worse net metering threatens the vertically integrated structure of the business. They are the power generators, the wholesalers, the distributors and the retailers, and they want to keep it that way. Other states, notably Arizona and Oklahoma, have instituted additional fees for home solar which will severely limit the development of truly distributed clean energy.

The Public Service Commission here in Arkansas is empowered by law to set rates and rate structures of electric utilities. Over the next year they will be conducting studies to determine if changes are needed (read additional costs to home solar users.) The utilities will be arguing that they have to claw back their profits to remain in business. Stay tuned.

The Future of Power

We are now at what appears to be the dawn of an energy transition. It will take a couple of generations to accomplish but it will happen. The transition is from an energy economy based on burning fossil fuels to clean sustainable electric energy generation from wind turbines and solar. We will transition from a few large power plants to a much more diffuse collections of wind farms, solar farms, and even more dispersed home solar photovoltaic arrays, all connect to a robustly interconnected transcontinental grid.

The technology exists and is operating on a small scale now but to bring in the future much will need to be done to strengthen, expand, and interconnect our electrical infrastructure. There are several drivers for the technological revolution. Fossil fuels are in limited supply, global warming is real, and large power plants are ideal targets for terrorism, an unfortunate reality in today’s world.

Fossil fuels are in limited supply so we continue to form alliances with despotic regimes and fight wars for access to oil. Even with the advent of new drilling technologies such as hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, we still need to import well over half of the crude oil we use in this country. Coal may be abundant here but it’s extraction and utilization has many negative consequences. The new energy economy can end this vicious entanglement, and produce energy in ways that are much, much cleaner.

Global warming is real and a real threat to all life on the planet. Not only is it getting hotter, but it is getting hotter faster. Although the global climate has changes over geologic time, we are driving changes to the climate at rates that in the past have lead to severe die-offs. Although we may survive without reversing global warming, it will be in a world with drastically reduced biological diversity. Producing our energy cleanly and renewably is the only realistic approach to reversing the dangers inherent in global warming.

Global economic inequity breeds despair, anger and, rightly or wrongly, attempts at retribution against the “haves” by the “have-nots.” Terrorism is a reality around the world, not just the near east and north Africa, but everywhere. An attack on a single large power plant could not only darken the the night, but threaten the well being and lives of hundreds of thousands of people in a single stroke. Widely distributed energy resources such as wind and solar coupled with a robust and redundant grid make that kind of threat essentially nonexistent.

The development of the new energy economy will not come with out costs, but the benefits of a sustainable energy future , and more stable ecological and political climate will far out way those costs. The process of developing, constructing, and maintaining the new energy infrastructure will provide jobs. The future energy economy will require a degree of technical expertise that generates well paying jobs the continue into the future and can’t be exported.

The upward arc of civilization is marked by our level of cooperation. The more we work together and the more of us that work together the more likely will be a bright, clean, and stable future.