Patrick Administration Awards $7M to Communities for Municipal Resiliency Projects
Grants are first of their kind made available through Governor Patrick’s Climate Preparedness Initiative
BOSTON – Thursday, September 25, 2014 – Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Maeve Vallely Bartlett today awarded $7.4 million in grants to municipalities under the Community Clean Energy Resiliency Initiative. The funding will be used for six projects to implement clean energy technologies to improve resiliency at critical facilities. This is the first round of grants through the initiative, which is part of Governor Deval Patrick’s comprehensive climate change preparedness effort.
“This initiative is about being proactive, and not waiting until the next severe storm to react,” said Governor Patrick. “These grants will assist communities in delivering critical services to residents, keeping people safer during times of danger.”
Through the Community Clean Energy Resiliency Initiative, $40 million in state funding is available to cities and towns that identify the facilities in their communities where the loss of electrical service would result in the disruption of a critical public safety or life sustaining function, including emergency services, shelters, food and fuel supply and communications infrastructure. Municipalities can use the funding to implement clean energy technologies to keep their energy systems operable.
“The Patrick Administration is committed to innovative solutions that both mitigate and prepare for climate change impacts in the Commonwealth,” said Secretary Bartlett. “We are proud to partner with municipalities to prevent disruption to critical facilities and services during times of emergency, while also continuing to secure our clean energy future in the long term.”
Under the program, administered by the Department of Energy Resources (DOER), cities and towns can apply for either technical assistance or direct project implementation. Projects eligible for funding include clean energy generation, energy storage, energy management systems, islanding technologies and microgrids.
Funding for these project grants and for 27 technical assistance awards previously announced comes from Alternative Compliance Payments (ACP), which are paid by electrical retail suppliers if they have insufficient Renewable or Alternative Energy Certificates to meet their compliance obligations under the Renewable and Alternative Portfolio Standard programs. Communities receiving technical assistance can apply for project implementation grants in a second solicitation later this year.
“This initiative provides opportunities for cities and towns to effectively support their communities during climate change-induced events by allowing continued service of critical facilities with clean energy technology solutions,” said DOER Acting Commissioner Meg Lusardi.
In January, Governor Patrick announced a coordinated plan for climate preparedness to increase resiliency across the Commonwealth. In addition to the energy resiliency initiative, the plan includes funding for critical coastal infrastructure and dam repair, including two new municipal grants offered by the Office of Coastal Zone Management (CZM). Their Community Resiliency Program offered $1 million in municipal grants to reduce or eliminate risk associated with coastal storms and sea level rise. As natural solutions have often proved to be the best defense against nature, CZM also implemented a $1 million program for Green Infrastructure for Coastal Resilience pilot project.
Municipalities receiving project implementation funding are as follows:
Berkley/Taunton - $1.46 million – The Berkley/Taunton Community Microgrid will be capable of providing near continuous emergency back-up services with a reduced carbon footprint while improving energy efficiency, reliability and resiliency to the towns of Berkley and Taunton. This project incorporates existing solar photovoltaics (PV) and diesel generation with a new battery array and control system within a microgrid configuration that will serve the middle school (a shelter), the Emergency Services Building, the Community School (a secondary evacuation shelter), the municipal fueling station/pump and the police/fire radio repeater.
Boston - $1.32 million – The City of Boston is proposing to install solar PV arrays with battery storage at four Boston Center for Youth and Families facilities that are designated emergency shelters and serve as local community centers for all ages. The solar PV with battery storage will enable the facilities to be islandable from the power grid, providing basic lighting, power and heating/cooling.
Greater Lawrence Sanitary District (GLSD) - $611,000 – The GLSD, a Regional Wastewater District, is pursuing a three phase construction project to accept source separated organics (SSO) and produce electricity and heat for its main plant and electricity for its pump station. With Phase 1 currently underway, DOER is looking to support Phase 2 by adding biogas metering and monitoring improvements, high pressure transfer pumps to move thicker SSO material and outside waste acceptance and blending tanks to move GLSD even closer to SSO acceptance and full utilization. This support will also prepare GLSD to embark on Phase 3, which will include the addition of a fourth anaerobic digester, gas storage, combined heat and power (CHP) generators (2), and biogas collection and safety equipment upgrades. This final phase will allow GLSD to operate completely separate from the grid during an outage.
Northampton - $525,401 – This project will incorporate solar PV and batteries with existing diesel generation at the Northampton Fire Department Headquarters, the sole city facility capable of providing a significant number of critical municipal services. The project will allow for diversified fuel sources available for power production during an extended outage, prioritize new emergency power generation systems, offset use of emergency fuel oil during long term power outages, reduce the environmental impacts from power generation for the facility and improve grid-tied power reliability by enabling peak-shaving and load shedding.
South Essex Sewerage District- $700,000 – This project is for the procurement and construction of a combined heat and power (CHP) facility at the South Essex Sewerage District, which includes Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody and Salem. The CHP unit is designed to provide a portion of the electrical power, in parallel with the grid, to operate the District’s wastewater treatment process and pumping equipment. The unit is black-start capable and is anticipated to provide back-up power to some portion of the plant in the event of an outage. Additionally, heat generated by the unit will provide hot water for essential odor control and building space temperature control.
Springfield - $2.79 million – The City of Springfield, in partnership with Baystate Health, is currently in design development of a 4.6 megawatt CHP plant which will provide electricity, chilled water and steam to the hospital. The plant would include a gas turbine generator, heat recovery steam generator, absorption chiller, black-start diesel generator and load management system. The plant will produce 80 percent of the hospital’s annual energy consumption, 68 percent of electricity and 97 percent of steam.
"With September as National Emergency Preparedness month, this grant announcement is particularly timely, and is a vital contribution to our efforts to keep residents safe," said Mayor Martin J. Walsh. "This funding from the Commonwealth will provide four of our shelters with clean and reliable sources of energy, even if the grid goes down. I applaud the Patrick Administration for their leadership."
“I want to applaud the Governor for making these crucial investments in Massachusetts communities in partnership with the Legislature. These funds will help to ensure that communities not only are prepared for the effects of climate change, but will make sure they do so using clean, reliable sources,” said Senator Marc Pacheco, Chairman of the Senate Committee on Global Warming and Climate Change.
“I am thrilled by Governor Patrick’s commitment to building resiliency in Massachusetts communities in the face of climate change. As we begin to experience more catastrophic weather events, it is critical to safeguard critical facilities to ensure that towns and cities can withstand potential impacts. It is also important that we invest in clean energy technology to mitigate the effects of climate change while preparing communities for severe weather events,” said Representative Frank Smizik, House Committee on Global Warming and Climate Change.
Since taking office, the Patrick Administration has been committed to mitigating the impacts of climate change by advancing renewable energy and energy efficiency in the Commonwealth. As a result, Massachusetts now has nearly 746 of wind and solar installed and has established the most ambitious energy efficiency plans in the nation.
The American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy (ACEEE) has named Massachusetts number one for three years running. Last year, Governor Patrick set a new solar goal to install 1,600 megawatts by 2020, after reaching the previous goal of 250 megawatts four years early. The clean energy revolution is yielding economic benefits as well, with 11.8 percent job growth in the last year and 24 percent growth in the last two years; nearly 80,000 people are employed in the clean tech industry in Massachusetts.
