With all of the hoopla swirling around the topic of the state’s energy
affairs (can you say: “$100 dollars per barrel,” “expiring power
contracts,” “commercial wind energy,” “energy efficiency funding,”
“nuclear energy safety,” “food versus biofuels,” and “carbon
footprint”?), we thought we’d jump into 2008 by focusing on what’s
going right on the Vermont energy front.

Our rationale? Just maybe, a focus on the positive will inform our next
steps toward a more secure, independent, clean, prosperous, and
nurturing Vermont.

So, just what is going right on the Vermont energy scene? A lot, it
turns out, but too much to fit into a pithy list of 10, or even 50. So
we backed it up into the categories of things going right. Still an
awesome task, but somewhat more manageable. What we came up with was a
grouping of organizations, initiatives, ideas, policies, projects, and
people that are positively affecting and informing our energy
directions.

Even still, this is just a taste. Our apologies to those we’ve omitted.
Let us know about you and your work; we’d love to hear what you are up
to so that we can talk to you the next time we round this particular
corner. Until then, here’s our list for 2008.

#1 Non-Profit Organizations
Have you seen the sister publications recently out from the Vermont
Council on Rural Development? Go download a copy and behold some real
reasons for hope (http://www.vtrural.org/reports-councils.php). The
first, issued in April of 2007, is entitled The Vermont Energy Digest
and provides an inventory of Vermont renewable energy and energy
efficiency measures already in place, as well as some thoughts about
developing more of the same from our very own fields, streams, sun,
wind, and smarts.

The second, Strengthening Vermont’s Energy Economy, came out last
August and reports on dozens of energy-related recommendations
generated by a slew of the state’s best energy, business, and policy
minds during a year-long process of talking, thinking, and writing.
Meaty, powerful stuff (with recommendations like increasing Vermont’s
net-metering limits and the development of a clean energy
workforce-education program) and quite possibly the best roadmap we
have for ensuring that Vermont’s energy future unfolds intentionally
and with the prosperity and sustainability of Vermont’s communities in
mind. Amen.

A quick rundown on some of the many organizations up to good things:
The Vermont Energy Investment Corporation is as busy as ever delivering
the all-important and award-winning Efficiency Vermont program, whose
efforts are meeting roughly 5.3 percent of Vermont's energy
requirements and cutting the state's annual electric load growth by
two-thirds. The Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund continues to foster the
in-state, on-farm biofuels sector.

Renewable Energy Vermont is hard at work at the statehouse, bringing the growing influence of Vermont
renewable energy businesses to bear on the decision-making process.
Other groups pursuing their distinct angle on Vermont’s energy
challenges: the Alliance for Climate Action, the Biomass Energy
Resource Center, the Conservation Law Foundation, the Sustainable
Energy Resource Group, the Vermont Biofuels Association, Vermont
Businesses for Social Responsibility, the Vermont Campus Energy Group,
the Vermont Earth Institute, the Vermont Environmental Consortium,
Vermont Interfaith Power & Light, the Vermont Natural Resources
Council, and the Vermont Public Interest Research Group.

#2 Businesses
If you want to see who’s leading the charge toward a more hopeful
Vermont energy future, look no further than Vermont’s business
pioneers. Not only are many of them making good products, providing
important services, and creating meaningful and attractive workplaces,
but they are doing it with an eye toward reducing their environmental
impact and energy costs, while increasing their odds of success in a
rapidly expanding “green” marketplace.

The flagship among them is the NRG Systems, Inc. in Hinesburg. When
this manufacturer of measurement equipment for the wind energy industry
needed to build a new facility in 2004, they did it with both kinds of
green in mind: Through the use of renewable energy, a super-insulated
structure, energy efficient windows, lighting and equipment, and a
climate control system that optimizes energy performance, their green
building uses a quarter of the energy that conventional buildings use.
“We spent more money to build our facility green, but we see it as a
long-term investment that will more than pay for itself in terms of
productivity gains and energy and operating cost savings,” NRG’s
founder David Blittersdorf told In Business magazine. “We have
essentially prepaid our energy bill by relying on renewable energy and,
as a result, we won't have to worry about rising energy costs in the
future.”

Other businesses making a dent in their energy use, climate change, and the bottom line:

Main Street Landing – This environmentally and socially conscious
Burlington-based property developer built the first, and so far, only,
LEED-certified (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design)
commercial/rental and performing arts center in Vermont. The fact that
this is commercial space means they had to plan wisely and couldn’t
break the bank to gain their green certification. Otherwise, their
tenants wouldn’t be able to afford the rents.

Otter Creek Brewing – Does beer make you smarter? It must. Otter Creek
Brewing, which has been using biodiesel to make the steam necessary for
cooking the grains at its Middlebury brewery, is taking its energy
initiative to the next level: The company is studying the question of
whether it makes sense to burn the brewery’s generated waste grain to
make steam, thus using beer to make beer. Cool.

Lake Champlain Chocolates – When this Burlington confectioner needed to
expand, it refurbished an old building and used the latest green
technologies in the process: energy efficient technologies, natural
lighting, energy efficient skylights and windows, high insulation
values for the walls and roof, low-emitting materials, water-efficient
plumbing fixtures, increased ventilation effectiveness, using
FSC-certified finished woods, designating recycling and bike rack
areas, and recycling building materials during construction. The
building is 27 percent more energy efficient than one built to code,
and costs 42 percent less to operate.

Gardener’s Supply Company – This long-time sustainability leader,
headquartered in Burlington, is taking a hard look at its carbon
emissions and doing something about getting them down. They’ve
contracted local firms to help them assess their carbon footprint and
energy usage from top to bottom, and are installing better lighting,
equipment, and processes in an on-going effort to reduce their
environmental impact.

And then there are the Vermont providers of these all-important
clean-energy services and technologies, busy providing tools, services
and resources, while creating economic opportunities for our citizens:
groSolar, NRG Systems, Draker Laboratories, Solar Works, Kilawatt
Technologies, Cx Associates, to name a few. Some of Vermont’s 22
electric utilities aggressively pursuing green and reliable energy
sources: Burlington Electric Department, Central Vermont Public
Service, Green Mountain Power, and Washington Electric Cooperative.

#3 Initiatives
The spirit of grassroots activism is alive and kicking on Vermont’s
energy front. The Vermont Climate and Energy Action Network
(www.vnrc.org/article/view/9452/1/625), a collaboration of several
Vermont non-profit and membership-based organizations – is working with
dozens of communities to jump-start their sustainable energy organizing
efforts. VECAN’s reader-friendly Town Energy and Climate Action Guide
provides a step-by-step process for establishing a community energy
committee, while offering a list of state and local resources, funding
sources, model bylaws, and more. Some of the communities already on the
move with VECAN’s help: Norwich, Bennington, Thetford, Hardwick, and
Greensboro.
Other important energy-related initiatives from around the state:

The Vermont 25x’25 Initiative aims to sustainably derive at least 25
percent of Vermont’s total energy needs from renewable sources by the
year 2025, mainly – but not exclusively – from our farm and forest
resources. (http://www.25x25.org/index.php?option=com_frontpage&Itemid=1)

The Vermont Apollo Alliance is a franchise of the national Apollo
Alliance, and is made up of organizations from the Vermont
environmental, labor, business, agriculture, social justice, and
community sectors working together to promote quality jobs and energy
independence for Vermont.
(http://www.apollochallenge.org/vermont/about.html)

The Governor’s Commission on Climate Change recently delivered its set
of recommendations for reducing the state’s contribution to climate
change to Governor Douglas. These are solid recommendations, most of
which will also serve the purpose of reducing Vermont’s need for
additional energy generation. (http://www.vtclimatechange.us/gccc.cfm)

#4 Heroes
There are those folks who have taken a reasonable amount of concern for
Vermont’s energy future and kicked it up a notch or two. Take Bob
Walker, for example. Bob runs the Sustainable Energy Resource Group out
of Thetford Center, and he's bringing his clean energy fervor to the
people in the form of home weatherization workshops, town energy
committee organizing, discounts on renewable systems, residential
energy assessment services, CFL sales, renewable energy workshops, and
all-around energy education. And Annie Dunn Watson, who is actively
spreading the word on peak oil, localization, and clean energy through
her work with the Vermont Peak Oil Network. Annie is herself a force of
nature whose energy we’d be wise to harness.

Of course, there is Vermont’s own Bill McKibben, who has done more than
his share to understand and spread the word about the perils of climate
change, and who avails himself to Vermont audiences everywhere to share
his learning and international perspective, testify at our Statehouse
on the topic of clean energy, and create clarion calls to action – such
as 2006’s five-day march from Ripton to Burlington.

Others Vermonters making their clean energy mark are Elizabeth Courtney
of VNRC, Robert Ide of the Vermont Department of Public Service, Netaka
White of the Vermont Biofuels Association, Ellen Kahler of the Vermont
Sustainable Jobs Fund, Chuck Ross of Senator Leahy’s office, Andrew
Perchlik of Renewable Energy Vermont, Paul Costello of Vermont Council
on Rural Development, Deb Sachs of the Alliance on Climate Action, and
Peter Shumlin and Vince Illuzzi – both from our state legislature.
Finally, our federal congressional delegation is a clean energy
advocate’s dream team: Senators Leahy and Sanders and Representative
Welch all get it, and are working hard to make it happen.

#5 State Policies
There has been a lot of good legislation coming out of the statehouse
in recent years, but unless you’re paying attention you might miss it.
Some positive moves: the Clean Energy Development Fund, the Solar and
Small Wind Incentive Program, and the Sustainably Priced Energy
Enterprise Development (SPEED) Program. Vermont’s policies supporting
renewables may not be as aggressive as, say, New Jersey’s, but we are
small, nimble, and holding our own – if not exceeding the efforts of
most states. Unfortunately, holding our own no longer cuts it, so last
year’s legislators crafted one of the nation’s most innovative energy
policies, which – along with several other good ideas – would have
created an all-fuels efficiency utility, doing for heating fuels what
Efficiency Vermont currently does for electricity. Nearly everybody
agreed on the concept and the differences came down to how to pay for
it.

This session, keep your eyes on Senate Bill No. 339, brought to you by
energy visionaries Sens. Ginny Lyons and Hinda Miller, and now in draft
form. Entitled the Energy Independence and Rural Economic Development
Act, the bill holds just about everything clean energy and money-saving
advocates could want. Chief among the proposals is a Clean Energy
Coordinating Council that will help make renewable energy and energy
efficiency programs a reality, while looking at alternative clean
energy funding methods, such as carbon taxation.

Senate President Peter Shumlin has vowed that energy and the
environment will again top his party’s 2008 legislative agenda,
recently telling the Burlington Free Press that Vermonters “spend more
than the state’s entire education budget for heating fuel and
gasoline.” More good news: Governor Douglas’s Commission on
Climate Change (mentioned above) also recommended that an all-fuels
efficiency utility concept be implemented.

Very little energy policy would be put into motion without the hard
work of the Vermont Department of Public Service, which represents the
public interest in matters regarding energy and other areas. These good
and smart people negotiate our energy contracts, promote energy
efficiency in the state, provide long-term planning, and administer
many of the projects, programs, and initiatives that are Vermont’s best
reasons for hope.

#6 Projects
The Vermont Public Service Board’s conditional approval of the
UPC-Vermont Wind electric-generation project proposed in Sheffield,
which grabbed headlines last year as commercial-scale wind energy in
Vermont tends to do. The big story was this: This wind farm – with 40
MW of installed capacity and 16 wind turbines providing renewable power
for 15,000 to 20,000 Vermont homes – would be the first commercial wind
farm to get the state’s nod since the construction of the Searsburg
project in 1997. A victory in itself, but the hope is that this project
will break what appears to be a logjam on commercial-scale wind
development in the state.

On the opposite end of the energy-producing spectrum, construction
continues on the South Farm Homes housing development located in
Hinesburg. These six homes incorporate passive and active solar
features, geothermal energy systems, and the latest in insulating and
energy efficiency technologies. The goal of the homes when all the
systems are in place (including a wind turbine that will provide for
the whole development) is that they will be net-zero energy residences,
producing as much (or more) energy than they use over the course of a
year. Might this set the bar for all new home construction in Vermont?

#7 Ideas
Over the last year, with the twin specters of high energy prices and a
warming landscape staring us down, dozens of ideas have emerged for how
to solve our energy woes – some homegrown and some from away, some
half-baked and some crisped to a golden brown. Our strength as a people
is adapting what works well elsewhere to our own backyard. Here are
some that might apply:

Zero-Energy Homes in California. Last fall, California energy
regulators adopted an ambitious first-of-its kind rule, making it a
goal that, through energy efficiency and renewable energy, all new
homes built after 2020 produce as much energy as they consume. By 2030,
all new commercial construction will be subject to the same
requirement. Considering the vision of the South Farm Homes project
described above, could Vermont be close behind?

Community-Supported Renewable Energy. Much like community-supported
agriculture, communities across the country are growing increasingly
interested in taking their energy destinies into their own hands by
financing and building clean energy projects that benefit the
communities themselves. Burlington Electric Department’s McNeil
Generating Station, a woodchip-burning plant, is a great example of
this concept – much of it bought and paid for by Burlington taxpayers.
Dozens of Vermont communities are currently exploring similar ideas
that involve community-scale renewable energy projects.

Boulder Carbon Tax. The city of Boulder, Colorado approved the
first-in-the-nation municipal carbon tax in 2006. The tax, assessed on
residents and businesses based on the amount of electricity they use,
increases monthly residential bills by about $1.33 for homes and $3.80
for businesses. The tax generates about $1 million annually, which is
used to fund energy efficiency services and products for Boulder’s
homes and businesses.

Feed-In Tariffs. These laws require utilities to purchase electricity
from renewable energy installations, but make it relatively easy on
them to do so by guaranteeing a good and stable price for the renewable
energy. According to Renewable Energy Access, Germany’s Feed-In Tariff
laws has made that nation a world leader in renewable energy, generated
billions of dollars a year in exports, created a quarter of a million
jobs, saved about 100 million tons of CO2 annually in recent years, and
set records for installed capacity across many technologies. All this
for a monthly cost of around $1.80 per household.

#8 Vermont’s Colleges and Universities
Vermont’s campuses have been hot beds for activism for generations, and
clean energy issues are now hitting the campus prime time spot.
Middlebury College might be the premier example, committing itself to
carbon neutrality, installing a wind turbine, and building the
soon-to-be-operational biomass-fired central heating and power plant.
And, of course, Middlebury students helped spawn the influential
grassroots Step It Up movement. Other Vermont campuses also on the
track: Champlain College is busy assessing its carbon footprint and
implementing energy efficiency measures; Green Mountain College has
established a greening fund and is putting it to work; the University
of Vermont has built what may be the first LEED-certified student
center in the nation; and Green Mountain College, Goddard College,
Middlebury, and UVM have signed onto the College and University
President’s Climate Commitment – along with about 450 other U.S.
campuses – putting them on a clear path toward achieving carbon
neutrality.

#9 Natural Resources
We are blessed in Vermont with many things, one of them being
plentiful renewable energy resources, and another being the energy
ethic and smarts to (1) use less energy in the first place and (2) use
our available resources sustainably. Our forests and farms are perhaps
our most significant near-term resource. Some estimates indicate that
we could derive nearly 20 percent of Vermont’s total energy needs from
these two sources, particularly if some of the latest technologies such
as algae-derived biodiesel and cellulosic ethanol, deliver as promised.
The winds on our ridge tops could also provide 10 percent-20 percent of
our electricity needs, according to a 2006 VPIRG study. Despite our
reputation for gray days, the sun is perhaps our greatest resource:
Enough sun hits the average house roof in Vermont to supply 10 times
the electricity used by the average homeowner. The trick is in
harnessing it economically. Geothermal and in-state hydroelectricity do
– and will continue to – have an important role to play. And, as
always, conservation and efficiency may be our greatest and most
cost-effective energy assets: A recent study from the Vermont
Department of Public Service estimated that cost-effective energy
savings could be as high as 19 percent of projected electricity sales
in the year 2015.

#10 You
Consider these facts from Energy Information Administration, keeper of all things statistical and energy-related in the U.S.:

• Total energy consumption in Vermont is the lowest of any state in the nation.
• Vermont has one of the lowest per-capita energy uses in the U.S., placing us 42 out of 50.
• Vermont is one of only two states in the country with no coal-fired power plants.

What accounts for our impressive energy track record? Yankee frugality?
Innovative efficiency programs, smart utilities, thoughtful
policymakers, communities, and citizens’ collectives? An inherent
understanding of the connection between energy use, the environment,
and quality of life? A deep-seated memory of the importance of energy
self-reliance without isolation? A steady diet of real maple syrup?

Probably some combination of all of these things. In other words: You.
You are the thoughtful and committed citizen that is the fundamental
thread of this Vermont fabric. In your daily actions and interactions,
you are making the decisions that have shaped our energy past and will
chart its future. You are the biggest reason for our energy hope going
forward.

What’s Next

Vermont does not lack for smart ideas, good planning, committed
organizations, and human energy. If anything’s missing, it’s an energy
vision for Vermont, something that pulls it all together – an
overarching articulation and process that distills all of these good
but disparate elements together into a coherent blueprint that we can
all agree on – or at least compromise around. We need a vision that
accounts for our economy, our health, our security, our values, and our
identity. Maybe it’s too tall an order. Maybe it’s wishful thinking.

Or maybe it’s coming in 2008, an outgrowth of all that we’re doing, all that we are, and all we hope to be.