² Paul Maycock (ed.), PV News, Vol. 17, No. 2 (February 1998), p. 1.
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³ Potential volume of PV purchased by the federal government assumes that a PV system has an average capacity factor of 18.5% (the median capacity factor value inferred from Wenger et al., Niche Markets for Grid-Connected Photovoltaics, IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, Washington, D.C., May 13-17, 1996), it would produce 12,965 kilowatt hours of electricity annually. PV estimate also assumes that 1996 energy consumption stays constant in 1997.
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⁴ Renewable Energy Working Group, "An Integrated Strategy for Renewable Energy in the Federal Sector," second draft, Washington, DC, June 1998.
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⁵ The agencies are the U.S. Department of Defense, the National Park Service, the Bureau of Land Management, and the U.S. Forest Service. From Government Procurement Project Web site: http://prince.essential.org/orgs/GPP/ energy_ideas/EI.0296/ EI.0296.04.html. Accessed July 13, 1998.
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⁶ National Performance Review, Reinventing Federal Procurement, PROC15: Encourage Best Value Procurement, National Performance Review Web site: http://www.npr.gov/library/nprrpt/annrpt/sysrpt93/reinven.html. Accessed July 10, 1998.
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⁷ According to a study by Sandia National Laboratories of PV system use in three federal agencies, the largest perceived barrier for two agencies, and the second largest barrier for the third, was the initial cost of PV systems. U.S. Department of Energy, Federal Technology Alert, DOE/GO-10098-484 (Washington, D.C., April 1998), p. 15.
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⁸ Note that the U.S. Department of Defense Tri-Service Photovoltaic Review Committee identified 3,900 cost-effective applications for PV, amounting to 423 MW of power.
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⁹ For example, Sandia Lab's survey of PV system use in three federal agencies found the largest perceived barrier for one agency, and the second largest for the remaining two, was lack of familiarity with PV, and "related to this is uncertainty with PV's performance record." U.S. Department of Energy, Federal Technology Alert, DOE/GO-10098-484 (Washington, D.C.: April 1998), p. 15.
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¹⁰ Doug DeNio, formerly of National Park Service, Lakewood, Colo., personal communication, May 22, 1998.
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¹¹ One Florida state official believes that state legislation that "encourages the use of solar technologies in state buildings when lifecycle costs indicate they are economically feasible" has done little to promote renewables; the reason, this official suggests, is that facility managers believe that renewables are overly expensive and unreliable and should not be included in a cost analysis in the first place.
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¹² Cost-effective niches do exist; their numbers can be multiplied with appropriate policy measures.
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¹³ Database of State Incentives for Renewable Energy (DSIRE), State Programs and Regulatory Policies Summary, at Web site: http://www.ncsc.ncsu.edu/dsire.htm. Accessed May 18, 1998.
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¹⁴ According to the National Performance Review, a study by the Center for Strategic and International Studies found that "it costs five times more to bid on a government contract than on a commercial job. Once a contractor has obtained a government contract, it costs that contractor three times its usual administrative expenses to comply with government controls." National Performance Review, PROC 12: Allow for Expande Choice and Cooperation in the Use of Supply Schedules, National Performance Review Web site: http://www.npr.gov/library/nprrpt/annrpt/sysrpt93/ reinven.html. Accessed July 10, 1998.
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¹⁵ Thomas Starrs and Vincent Schwent, "Government Buydowns for the Residential Market," Expanding Markets for Photovoltaics (Washington, DC: Renewable Energy Policy Project, 1998).
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¹⁶ A negative example of a clear commitment and subsequent implementation is Executive Order 12902. Issued by President Clinton in 1993, the executive order directed procurement officers to purchase more renewable energy, but did not require such purchases. The White House failed to follow the order with essential reforms of Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) and Office of Management and Budget directives that discriminated against renewables. The result was that the existing procurement system held precedence over the executive order, and the federal government did not become a significant consumer of renewables
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¹⁷ Jerry Anderson, Siemens, and Secretary of International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) Technical Committee 82, Camarillo, Calif., personal communication, July 9, 1998.
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¹⁸ Jerry Anderson, Siemens, and Secretary of International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) Technical Committee 82, Camarillo, Calif., personal communication, July 9, 1998; Richard DeBlasio, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, Colo., personal communication, July 27, 1998.
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¹⁹ Glen Koontz, Photovoltaic Purchasing Guidebook for Local and State Governments, a project of the Urban Consortium Energy Task Force of Public Technology, Inc. and the City of Albuquerque, N.M.
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²⁰ Jack Werner, Climate Institute and Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC), Washington, D.C., personal communication, July 15, 1998.
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²¹ George Post, General Services Administation (GSA) Public Buildings Service, Tampa, Fla., Field Office, personal communication, July 14, 1998; and Leslie Libby, City of Austin, Tex., personal communication, July 14, 1998.
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²² Don Osborn, Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD), Sacramento, Calif., personal communcation, Feb. 11, 1998. Manufacturing facilities for PV modules and balance-of-supply components are set for operation by the end of 1998, and will help to create predesigned, standardized modules for building integration, thereby benefitting the PV incentive program as well as providing local economic development opportunities.
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²³ Green power is defined as 100% renewable from solar, wind, biomass, small-scale hydro or fuel cells and as firm and uninterruptible.
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²⁴ A simple illustration of this is found in the following scenario. A utility offers to partially subsidize the cost of PV systems for its customers. The General Services Administration (GSA) has recently been given the authority and the budget to build a new office building in the utility's service region; the agency did not know of the utility's offer at the time of its budget request, however, and the approved budget request did not include funds for a PV system. Now that GSA has learned of the offer, it believes that it has enough money in its utility budget to cover the cost of a PV system as well as to pay its electric bill. Because of the prohibition of commingling funds, however, the agency cannot use its excess of utility funds to participate in the program.
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²⁵ A significant exception to the 10-year limitation is the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), which can contract for up to 30 years under certain waiver conditions. It is not certain how often DoD facilities have used the waiver.
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²⁶ The National Park Service estimated a cost of $8 per ton of carbon dioxide and $3.40 per pound of nitrogen oxide. From Government Procurement Project, Web site, http://prince.essential.org/orgs/GPP/energy_ideas/EI.0296/ EI.0296.04.html. Accessed July 13, 1998.
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²⁷ Executive Order 12873 required federal agencies to purchase recycled products. However, the Order contained several loopholes based on "unreasonable" cost, unreasonable availability, and poor performance. Recently, Executive Order 13101 closed these loopholes. See Government Purchasing Project, Analysis of Executive Order 13101, September 14, 1998 (Washington, D.C.).
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²⁸ Tom Berrone, New York State Energy Research and Development Agency (NYSERDA), Albany, N.Y., personal communication, July 14, 1998.
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²⁹ National Performance Review, Reinventing Federal Procurement, PROC 12: Allow for Expanded Choice and Cooperation in the Use of Supply Schedules, Web site: http://www.npr.gov/library/nprrpt/annrpt/sysrpt93/reinven.html. Accessed July 10, 1998.
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³⁰ See Peter Asmus, Power to the People: How Local Governments Can Build Green Electricity Markets, REPP Issue Brief No. 9, Renewable Energy Policy Project (REPP), Washington, D.C., January 1998. One example of public-private aggregation mentioned in the REPP issue brief includes the Windsource program in Colorado. The cities of Denver, Boulder, and Colorado Springs are aggregating demand with nongovernment loads to purchase wind power from the Public Service of Colorado, an investor-owned utility.
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³¹ Federal Energy Management Program Overview Web site: http://www/eren.doe.gov/femp/overview.html. Accessed April 8, 1998.
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³² The Federal Supply Schedule (FSS) has a listing of PV companies that have contracts with GSA for "indefinite quantity and delivery." Companies respond to a General Services Administration (GSA) Standing Request for Proposals, which has selection criteria but does not have specifications or projects in mind. Companies get listed on the FSS for a broad category of products. The contract with GSA specifies prices for specific products. The prices are based on the commercial prices offered for these products in the private market, as required by Federal Acquisition Regulations (FAR) for "fair and reasonable" pricing. The contract contains a price adjustment policy that mirrors prices in the private market for a company's products. Vicki Moore, General Services Administration, Fort Worth, Tex., personal communication, June 22, 1998.
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³³ For purchases below $25,000, the facility manager can collect information and price quotes from three potential vendors. For purchases above $25,000, the purchaser has to advertise a request-for-proposal through the Commerce Business Daily and then evaluate submitted proposals. Doug DeNio, formerly of National Park Service, Lakewood, Colo., personal communication, May 19, 1998.
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³⁴ Green power is defined as 100% renewable from solar, wind, biomass, small-scale hydro or fuel cells and as firm and uninterruptible.
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³⁵ The 1 MW minimum is designed to encourage learning in each agency and promote diverse demand for the PV industry, while providing flexibility to the federal government to channel projects to the most cost-effective applications.
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³⁶ Based on the following: The government's 1996 electricity use was 184.3 trillion Btu, or 53.9 billion kWh. Assuming that a PV system has an average capacity factor of 18.5% (the median capacity factor value inferred from Wenger et al., Niche Markets for Grid-Connected Photovoltaics, IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, Washington, D.C., May 13-17, 1996), it would produce 12,965 kWh of electricity annually. In total, 1,230 MW of PV would be required to fulfill the total solar technology band during the 10-year program period. Annual sales would amount to 123 MW annually.
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³⁷ Paul Maycock (ed.), PV News, Vol. 17, No. 2 (February 1998), p. l.
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³⁸ Ed Holt, Ed Holt and Associates, South Harpswell, Maine, personal communication, Sept. 24, 1998. The study covers programs that offer green power through an energy tariff, based on the amount of energy used by the customer. Holt estimates that over half of the green pricing programs nationwide are based on energy tariffs. The programs surveyed included a mix of existing and new renewable energy capacity (not including large hydroelectric electricity generation) and does include PV. A concerted government procurement program would require a greater contribution from new renewable sources, which tend to cost more than existing sources in which extra electricity production does not add to capital costs but merely increases operations costs. However, a concerted procurement program would reduce the average costs of new projects through improved economies of scale for renewable energy technology production and installation. Thus, the 2˘ premium is retained.
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³⁹ It is important to note that excessive sales may inflate PV prices as supply scrambles to meet a sharp demand increase-and hamper government purchases of PV for the following year under a declining-cost scheme. Such market impacts must be incorporated into a federal analysis, in cooperation with renewable energy trade associations, that seeks to maintain "sustained orderly development" of the PV industry.
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⁴⁰ See Larry Shirley, Shawn Fitzpatrick, and Chris Larsen, "Public Education and Professional Training," Expanding Markets for Photovoltaics (Washington, DC: Renewable Energy Policy Project, 1998).
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⁴¹ This suggestion is currently under development by the National Joint Apprenticeship Training Committee, which is working with the Inernational Brotherhood of Electrical Workers (IBEW), United Power Limited, and the National Electrical Contractors Association to certify IBEW locals for PV installation. The effort will seek to train over 1 million union electricians in PV installation. Paul Maycock (ed.), PV News, Vol. 17, No. 7, p. 2.
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⁴² Government operations committees are involved in matters having to do with government organization and operation. Authorizing committees are responsible for telling agencies how they may use their appropriations. An appropriations with no specific authority may not be expended.
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⁴³ For a discussion of the national renewables portfolio standard (RPS), see Ray Williamson, "Appendix A: A Portfolio Approach to Developing Renewable Resources," Expanding Markets for Photovoltaics (Washington, DC: Renewable Energy Policy Project, 1998). For a discussion of the systems benefit charge (SBC) in California, see Thomas Starrs and Vincent Schwent, "Government Buydowns for the Residential Market," Expanding Markets for Photovoltaics (Washington, DC: Renewable Energy Policy Project, 1998).
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