San Francisco - Train the Trainers, Solar Champions Program

Published by sylvia | Filed under Uncategorized

As part of the $2 millions given to a few cities in the US to promote renewable energy, San Francisco is rolling out a successful “Train the Trainers” Solar Champions course at the PG&E energy center (between 4th and 5th on Howard).  The energy center repeatedly teaches a solar energy fundamentals class taught by Pete Schoemaker, who really knows his stuff.  This new, special, “Solar Champions” version is about twice as long, and trains people how to re-give Pete’s world class slideshow to neighborhood meetings, HOA’s, wherever, whomever.  The idea is to use proactive citizens to educate the public on solar. It’s worth your time.

Here are the details of the Solar Neighborhood Champions class.  Contact Jason Houck to signup.

If you are a solar energy enthusiast who is interested in organizing a “group purchase” of solar energy, please email us at sylvia@1bog.org. we can help you get started.

Go Solar!

Sources of Electricity in California: help us break the trend.

Published by sylvia | Filed under Uncategorized

Together we can send a strong message to California’s leaders that we are ready to get serious about Renewable Energy!

2007 Total System Power in Gigawatt Hours

Fuel Type	In-State Generation	Northwest Imports	Southwest Imports	Total System Power	Percent of Total System Power
Coal*	4,190	6,546	39,275	50,012	16.6%
Large Hydro	23,283	9,263	2,686	35,232	11.7%
Natural Gas	118,228	1,838	16,363	136,063	45.2%
Nuclear	35,692	629	8,535	44,856	14.8%
Renewables	28,463	6,393	688	35,545	11.8%
Biomass	5,398	837	1	6,236	2.1%
Geothermal	12,999	0	440	13,439	4.5%
Small Hydro	3,675	4,700	18	8,393	2.8%
Solar	668	0	7	675	0.2%
Wind	5,723	857	222	6,802	2.3%
Total	209,856	24,669	67,547	302,072	100.0%

*Note: In earlier years the in-state coal number included coal fired power plants owned by California utilities

Source: gosolarcalifornia.ca.gov

Take action: Critical vote on California Solar Bill August 7th

Published by sylvia | Filed under Uncategorized

It’s action time.  One of the most important solar bills in the California legislature faces a critical vote in the Senate Appropriations committee on Thursday, August 7.  We need your help to get it through.

AB 1451 (Leno) would extend the current property tax exemption for solar installations-due to sunset in 2009–to match the California Solar Initiative, and make some tweaks to make it more useful for builders incorporating solar in new home construction.  It’s also critical for the utility-scale solar industry, leveling the playing field with fossil-fuel plants and reducing solar’s cost by about a penny per kWh.

All told, AB 1451 makes everything we are trying to do with energy in the state, from AB 32 to the California Solar Initiative to the Renewable Portfolio Standard, cheaper and easier.

We can’t afford to lose this one.

Take action here votesolar.org and here Solar Nation

Beyond Solar: Energy Efficient Living

Published by sylvia | Filed under Uncategorized

Occasionally, I’ll post some tips to more energy efficient living. This is our first round in a series that hopefully will compile most of the information that is out there already and some original thinking.  Much of this comes from aggregated post, blogs, newsletters I’ve gathered over the last weeks. If you have a tip to greener living you’d like to share please send me an email, I’ll post it for the benefit of us all!

Energy Efficient Living Manual – Chapter 1

Lower your thermostat and put on a sweater, a shawl or a hat: you’ll look stylish. You’ll be saving yourself some dollars, and saving the earth some extra carbon. And you skin will thank you for that – cooler air is better than dry overheated one.

When buying a washer, choose a Front Loader, they’re more efficient, most come with short cycle (my favorite) and you can load them up to max and still have clean laundry.

Air-dry your clothes whenever possible. Buy a clothesline; put it up in your bathroom, your veranda, in your backyard.

If you have no choice but to use the dryer, clean the lint trap before loading it. If the air can flow freely your dryer won’t work overtime to compensate, you’ll save up to 30% energy on each load according to the Sierra Club. Occasionally, wash the lint trap mesh to remove cleanup from dryer sheets and other small material.

Fix the flush and any dripping faucets. The waste of water can represent hundreds of gallons a year for a leaking flush or dripping faucet. How much water does a standard toilet uses per flush? If it’s a pre-1980s toilet between 5 to 7 gallons. For a post-1980s, 3.5 gallons per flush, for the newest low-flow models it’s about 1.6 gallons per flush. If you have an old toilet model, you can install a homemade displacement device – which is basically a plastic bottle filled with sand or pebbles placed inside the tank, it reduces the amount of water flushed each time. Ideally you’ll want to replace your old talk with a lowflow tank. Most cities have some form of rebate program for energy and resources saving appliances and equipment.

Change your shower head to a water efficient showerhead. Besides taking shorter showers, you can help reducing your water consumption by changing to a water efficient showerhead. Most will use about 1.6 gallons of water per minute (gpm) as opposed to the standard 2.5 gpm or more. If you are like most Americans, your average shower time is 10 minutes that is 10 Gallons of water a day, 14,600 liters of water not wasted each year, just by changing your shower head.

Unplug your Appliances and Kill That costly Watt: Unplug your appliances (computer, fax, cell phone, iPod, TV, radio) or get a multiplug outlet with an ON/OFF switch. Even when not working your appliances are still using energy called “phantom power”, “standby power” or “leaking electricity”. Unplugging cuts off that drainage

You can use a neat device Kill a Watt to determine how much ‘drainage’ you are getting from your appliances. You’ll be surprised by how expensive that “phantom power” really is.

Upgrade your light bulbs to CFLs. We’ve heard that one before, but if you haven’t yet, bite the bullet and just do it. For those who are still working through this. CFL stands for Compact Fluorescent Light bulb. Most CFLs are designed to replace an incandescent lamp and can fit in your existing light fixtures; they give the same amount of light than incandescent, use less power and have a longer rated life. In the United States, a CFL can save over $30 in electricity costs over the lamp’s lifetime compared to an incandescent lamp and save 2000 times its own weight in greenhouse gases.

and… Turn Off the Lights.
… right.

Solar Investment Tax Credit Bill Introduced by Senate Finance Committee

Published by sylvia | Filed under Uncategorized

We at 1 Block Off the Grid are pleased to see movement on renewing the solar investment tax credit. This program has been instrumental in driving and accelerating solar to date. Combining the Federal, state and local solar incentives with the purchasing power of 1 Block Off the Grid makes solar more accessible. Please call your senator to support this bill. Learn more about how 1 Block Off the Grid works.

Senator Baucus, Chair of the Finance Committee, and Senator Reid, Majority Leader, have introduced a Senate version of the storied clean energy investment tax credit bill. It’s S3335, the Jobs, Energy, Families and Disaster Relief Act of 2008.* It contains the extensions to clean energy investment tax credits (ITC) that we’ve been promoting for so long, and it could come up for a vote as early as Tuesday July 29th.

What’s different this time, that might lead to a bill actually making it through both chambers? Well, on this occasion the document is coming from the Senate with funding provisions attached–the very issue that senators have objected to, for over a year now. This means that a lot of bipartisan shaping of the bill has been going on, to either remove provisions that senators disliked or add provisions that would switch their votes to ‘yea’ (such as tax relief for those affected by natural disasters this year). But most importantly to the House, it ensures that the clean energy tax credits can be paid for without adding to the deficit. And it means that:

• commercial and residential solar 30% ITCs will be extended for 8 years
• the residential cap on the ITC will be doubled to $4000
• corporate and individual taxpayers can claim the ITC against the AMT
• investor-owned utilities can claim the ITC directly

It sounds like there’s a good faith effort, this time, to provide sufficient ‘feel-good’ measures all around to put the dreaded filibuster to bed. We sure hope so. But to make sure, can you hit your senators one more time with an e-mail, reminding them how important this bill is to the future of solar power in America?

Following this link: Solar Nation

Enter your ZIP code and press GO to TAKE ACTION!

*For parliamentary junkies, this replaces HR6049, which was the House-originated vehicle. Assuming it passes, the language will be folded back into HR6049 for the president’s signature, because all bills containing revenue-raising measures must originate in the House.

source: Solar Nation