By Brett Rosenberg
January 12, 2009

A major theme to emerge among the water and wastewater sectors involves reducing the amount of energy that operations have historically required to adequately treat water. Nationwide, according to EPA estimates, wastewater and drinking water plants spend upwards of $4 billion per year on energy; and in many cases, are responsible for of up to a third of a municipality’s total energy costs. A by-product of all energy use is greenhouse gas emissions. As several presentations during this year’s Mayors Water Council Summit demonstrated, the massive local expenditures on water utility energy use can be greatly reduced, saving cities economic resources while reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

The US EPA’s Energy Star program, familiar to most as a symbol that an electric appliance meets certain energy efficiency standards, also extends to energy management at water and wastewater treatment plants. Through its Internet-based Portfolio Manager system, the EPA provides a tool through its Energy Star program for plant managers to catalog, track and adjust operations at their facilities to optimize energy use while eliminating unnecessary practices. This saves money and reduces the pollution that leads to global warming and hazardous air quality.

According to EPA’s Jason Turgeon, who presented “a sales pitch for energy efficiency” to mayors and other participants at the water summit in Palm Beach, managers of drinking water systems and wastewater treatment plants can now track energy use, energy costs, and associated carbon emissions by using Portfolio Manager, EPA’s on-line benchmarking tool. Portfolio Manager also offers wastewater treatment plant managers the ability to compare the energy use of their plants with other plants using the EPA energy performance rating system. Portfolio Manager, according to Turgeon, helps users set building performance goals; prioritize facilities for improvements; measure progress over time; and recognize high performing buildings.

Turgeon cited several examples in which New England municipal utilities were able to use money saved through using the Energy Star Portfolio Manager tool to invest in other local operations. In Falmouth (MA), for instance, the city used Portfolio Manager to track energy use in a series of pumps and, in turn, chose a course of action that led to upgrades and ultimate savings in both energy expenditures and air emissions. The city recouped its up-front replacement costs in just over two years, and saved enough annually to cover a firefighter’s salary. In another example, Turgeon described how the Kennebec (ME) Sanitary Treatment District made upgrades to its facility last year that included a heat recovery system. The upgrades paid off over the winter by saving the facility more than 20,000 gallons of fuel oil – more than one-half its annual consumption, at an avoided cost of $87,000.

These examples illustrate how utilities can use a management system that continually assesses, monitors and adjusts operations in order to reap environmental and economic benefits. The Portfolio Manager program, according to Turgeon, uses a utility’s data to rate its performance against others, using millions of gallons of water treated per day as a basis of comparison. The Energy Star Challenge rating system compels utilities to create an action plan to improve energy efficiency by ten percent or more.

In the spirit of improving performance, Laura Spanjian, Assistant General Manager of External Affairs for the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission (SFPUC), presented several examples of how her city has embarked on the road to energy efficiency and emissions reductions, including the use of solar power at its water treatment plants.

The SFPUC, according to Spanjian, currently operates over two megawatts (MW) of photovoltaic projects located throughout San Francisco, including water treatment sites, with another five MW to be completed in 2009. The design-build projects, funded by a Sustainable Energy Account, derived from SFPUC Power revenues via Clean Renewable Energy Bonds (CREBs) and Power Purchase Agreements, have, in total, generated over four million kilowatt-hours of clean renewable electricity for the city. At the city’s Southeast Water Treatment Plant, the solar installation provides 1.5 percent of the plant’s energy, completely emissions-free.

In describing the funding mechanisms, Spanjian said that the CREBs provide zero-interest financing for renewable energy projects under a federal IRS program, which benefits the City by providing early capital that can then be used to construct additional projects. The SFPUC’s power purchase agreement, based on an April, 2008 RFP, set a 25-year term with buyout option after seven years. It will take advantage of 30 percent federal tax credit, which Congress recently extended by eight years.

Other similar programs in store for the city’s water utilities include an energy-efficient lighting retrofit that will replace inefficient lighting fixtures, lamps, ballasts, and controls with new energy efficient technologies across wastewater facilities, with projected savings of 750,000 kWh/year and demand reduction of 41 kW. At the Southeast Plant, the cogeneration system is currently in the process of being retrofitted, with its gas handling project designed to improve quality of digester gas; once complete next year, the plant will produce 1700 kW, approximately 55 percent of total facility load.

The city, in partnership with the Clinton Climate Initiative, is also creating an urban destination called the Civic Center Sustainability District. The District, touted as a Blueprint for Urban Redesign using a community approach to development has the goals of reducing energy demand by 33 percent; meeting 35 percent peak energy power demand with renewable sources (solar and wind); decreasing potable water demand by 80 percent; lessening wastewater treatment capacities by 45 percent; and reducing the carbon footprint by 2,480 tons, equivalent to 1,433 households/year.

John Young, President of American Water Works Service Company then gave an overview of energy management and alternative energy use in the water sector, from a private sector perspective. Young suggested that a paradox exists in the world of water treatment, in which new technologies come along that make water cleaner but at the same time use more energy and create more greenhouse gas emissions than earlier treatment processes.

In recognition of the fact that these energy requirements are the basis for the vast majority of American Water’s greenhouse gas emissions, the company undertook an effort to reduce emissions companywide. In 2006, according to Young, American enlisted in the EPA’s Climate Leaders Program, a voluntary partnership with U.S. companies to develop long-term, comprehensive climate change strategies. Through Climate Leaders, American conducted an inventory of corporate greenhouse gas emissions, set corporate-wide emissions reduction goals, and continues to measure and report GHG emissions to the EPA.

Through Climate Leaders, American has established an energy group. Throughout the company, the energy group focuses on decreasing non-revenue water – i.e., leaky underground pipes – since decreases in the amount of water pumped lead to lower electrical use; increasing pumping efficiency; conducting pump tests and optimizing efficiency by trimming or replacing impellers; installing new high efficiency pumps and motors; upgrading lighting to latest generation florescent lighting; and optimizing HVAC systems to provide only that level of cooling or dehumidification that is needed.

Young also said that American is installing solar arrays, where feasible, as more a means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions than saving money. He mentioned also that many solar projects were delayed due to the lack of product availability.