Conservation Resources Advisory Committee
MEETING NOTES
January 21, 2003, 9 a.m.-4:30 p.m.
NORTHWEST POWER PLANNING COUNCIL OFFICES
PORTLAND, OREGON
DRAFT
1. Greetings, Introductions and Review of the Agenda.
The January 21, 2003 Conservation Resources Advisory Committee meeting, held at the Northwest Power Planning Council's offices in Portland, Oregon, was chaired by Tom Eckman of the Council staff.
The following is a distillation (not a verbatim transcript) of items discussed during the call, together with actions taken on those items. Please note that some enclosures referenced in the body of the text may be too lengthy to attach; all enclosures referenced are available upon request from Eckman at 503/222-5161.
Eckman welcomed everyone to today's meeting, led a round of introductions, then reviewed today's agenda. Nancy Hirsh requested that the November 4th meeting notes be revised to use ?NW? rather than ?Northwest? in all references to the NW Energy Coalition. Hirsh also asked that the description of the Tellus study be changed to a ?survey and analysis? of the data, rather than just a survey. Both amendments to the minute notes were accepted by the CRAC. The CRAC adopted the revised minutes. Eckman asked that any additional comments on the summary of the November 4, 2002 CRAC meeting be submitted to him as soon as possible.
2. Presentation and discussion on the staff's draft assessment of commercial sector non-building energy efficiency measures.
Charlie Grist introduced the topic by reminding the group that the commercial sector includes a large fraction of electricity use in non-building applications and in equipment and plugs loads. Today's discussion will review staff's draft assessment on conservation potential in some of those areas. The assessment of more traditional measures on lighting and HVAC will be taken up at later meetings.
Charlie began by giving the context for the savings estimates presented today. These are estimates of technical and economic conservation potential. They have not been derated for what fraction is achievable, nor for what fraction of the potential will occur do to price, practice and market changes. The threshold for what is reported as economic is based on a benefit/cost ratio from a total resource cost (TRC) perspective. The TRC B/C ratio is the present value of all the measure benefits divided by the present value of the all the measures costs. Benefits include non-energy benefits where they are identifiable and quantifiable. Costs include all known costs, changes in O&M and estimates of program costs. Measure costs and savings are calculated using the Council's ProCost model.
Jim Lazar asked what ProCost inputs are used, particularly with regard to externalities. Charlie responded that key ProCost inputs are modified from what is used by the RTF in two important areas. The Council analysis uses zero externalities credit as well as a default program cost of 20% of capital. The staff analysis of environmental externalities values will occur in the portfolio analysis phase of the development of the power plan.
Charlie listed the measures to be discussed today and quizzed the group on which measure identified the largest potential savings. CRAC members made their guesses. There was no central tendency of the estimates. Charlie went on to describe municipal sewage treatment estimates first.
The estimates of the number of facilities, energy use, efficiency measures, savings potential and non-energy benefits were reviewed. Then the key inputs that drive the use and savings assumptions were reviewed. These include estimates of the stock, savings potential, non-energy benefits and costs by treatment type and facility size. A data set of 194 PNW facilities provided the energy use per million gallons per day of flow treated by treatment type. A database of about 500 facilities provided the estimates of the type and size of current treatment plants. Energy savings potential estimates are based on data from pilot programs operated by BPA and the Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance (NEEA). Technical and economic potential of 74 MWa was identified at a weighted-average cost of 23 mills per kWh.
Stan Price expressed concern that savings estimates from the NEEA and BPA pilots are all under the process optimization approach, and that Council estimates should not neglect considerable savings from pumps, motor efficiency upgrades, and VSDs. Nancy Hirsch concurred and Stan suggested data may be available from the work of ITT Flight. Charlie concluded the sewage treatment discussion by noting that his sources indicate the magnitude of energy use in industrial sewage treatment is similar to municipal, and that significant savings potential exists at industrial sites as well.
Next up was a discussion of LED traffic signals where Charlie estimated 14 MWa potential at 29 mills per kWh. Regionally 56% of reds have been changed out already, 38% of greens and 4% of walk/don't walk signals according to an informal phone survey of key jurisdictions.
The discussion moved to LED exit signs analysis pointed to 52 MWa available in 2025 at 27 mills/kWh average. Uncertainty around the existing stock estimate and the fraction already converted is considerable. Conservative assumptions were used in both cases.
Municipal water treatment was the next subject discussed. Charlie reviewed estimates of the number of facilities (4574) and total regional electricity use ((120 to 150 MWa) to pump and treat municipal water supply in the PNW. Savings potential in system optimization as well as pump and motor improvements abound. Preliminary estimates of savings are in the 24 to 45 MWa range. Two facilities have participated in a BPA-sponsored pilot and verified savings was 13% and 18% from low-cost measures. Charlie noted that better estimates of costs and savings are needed to develop supply curve estimates and suggested this is an area ripe for further pilot study. Charlie also noted that industrial water supply systems have a similar magnitude of energy use and potentially, energy conservation potential.
Network PC Management was next. Total economic potential was estimated at 57 MWa in 2025. The estimate is based on RTF values for savings in three modes of operation, active, low-power and off and the power consumption rates used in the RTF analysis which are based on recent 2002 surveys of the penetration of power management operation. These assumptions make modest improvement to the rate at which power management is deployed, for example moving from 60% penetration now in monitors to 85%. Charlie noted that the Council estimate diverges from the RTF in that it assumes PC and monitor power consumption changes over the forecast period. LCD monitor use is about half of CRT monitor use in active mode. Processors on the other hand are getting more energy intensive and the Council estimate increased average active power from 65 watts to 80 watts as equipment changes out. Dick Watson asked what turnover rates were assumed since his experience is that monitor life is a lot longer than processor life. Charlie said he modeled the turnover at estimates of monitor life of 6 years but shaped it in an ?S? curve that has about 60% replaced in 6 years with the remainder dropping out by 15 years. Charlie added that his estimate of future stock of desktop system is much lower than that used by the Alliance because the he believes penetration of PCs per worker on networks where the measure is applicable is nearing saturation. The Council estimate ties the increases the PC's to commercial sector employment and increases the density about 20% over the forecast period. Estimated employment growth is 1.5% per year and PC growth is estimated at 1.7% per year. Alliance assumed growth rate is 2.5% per year.
Charlie discussed that industry analysts are forecasting LCD monitors replace CRTs in the new monitor market by 2005. Consequently his forecast replaces CRTs by year 2015 or so in the forecast. The savings (45MWa in 2025) will be removed from the forecast.
Next up was power supplies. A conservative estimate of regional potential in the commercial sector is 7 MWa based on Chris Calwell's research at Ecos Consulting and some work done by LBL. More in residential. Focus is national and international standards.
Packaged refrigeration units represent a large savings potential. These are vending machines, ice makers, reach-ins, soda machines, walk-ins and water coolers. Detailed supply curves and stock estimates for the PNW have not been completed yet. But the scale of the potential regional savings is on the order of 100MWa on today's stock based on work by ACEEE. The focus again is national standards, but there is plenty of room for utility programs in this area. Residential refrigeration efficiency efforts have cut residential refrigeration efforts well more than 50% over the last decade. Similar measures are available in commercial units. Nancy Hirsh asked if the Council had considered savings from the mini-fridges now so prevalent in hotels and college dorms. Charlie said he had not seen any data but would check it out.
Charlie identified a list of non-building measures still to be evaluated including commercial clothes washers, printers and copiers, parking garage ventilation, air compressors, GFX heat exchangers, street and highway lighting and high velocity hand dryers.
Charlie then summarized the draft findings which total to over 400 MWa of Technical and economic potential. Liz Klumpp asked how that compared to the Council's estimate in the last power plan. Charlie replied that except for LED exit lights and some of the refrigeration, none of the measures discussed today were considered in the Fourth power Plan. For the most part, this is previously unidentified conservation potential.
Following lunch Eckman presented an overview of the analytical approach used to assess the conservation potential in residential space conditioning end uses. He began by indicating that the scope of the analysis included three vintages of buildings (pre-1980, post-1980 to pre-1993 and post-1992 construction), three building types (single family, multifamily & manufactured homes), eight heating and cooling combinations and both heating and cooling end uses. He noted that the Fourth plan's assessment did not address cooling and only considered two housing vintages. In addition, Eckman continued, the Fourth plan's assessment did not look at heating system conversions to heat pumps and duct sealing, while the most recent assessment did.
He then proceeded to describe the steps used to derive the conservation resource potential using a flow chart. The first step was to develop the ?baseline? efficiency characteristics for each of the building, heating and cooling system types. This information was obtained from a review of current codes and standards, national and regional market surveys, manufacturer's data and utility program data, specifically the fiscal year 2002 Bonneville Conservation and Renewable Resources Rate Discount Program data base. These characteristics were then used to as inputs to the building energy use simulation model to develop the energy savings estimates for each measure. The cost and savings data are then used in the Council's ProCost model to determine each measure's cost effectiveness.
Eckman then noted that many of the measures under consideration interact with one another. For example, the savings heat pumps are a function of the heating loads in a building that are a function of the how well insulated the building is. In order to address these interactions, Eckman said he first determine the maximum insulation levels that are cost-effective for each building type. Once this level is known, he estimates the savings from ?duct system? efficiency improvements and finally from conversions to heat pumps or upgrades to higher efficiency heat pumps and air conditioners. Cartwright asked whether this logic of applying the most cost-efficient measures first, was what happened in utility programs. Eckman indicated that this was unlikely, since utilities typically permit their customers to select the measures they want to install and do not require that these exactly follow the audit recommendations. He noted, that the approach he follows provides a more conservative estimate of the savings from non-insulation measures, since the actual houses installing heat pumps may not have all of the ?cost-effective? insulation measures in them. Harris asked Eckman whether he had accounted for the heating system efficiency impacts when computing the resource potential for new single-family homes. After some discussion it was agreed that some revisions should be made to account for these in the thermal envelop savings analysis, but that the heat pump savings were correct.
Eckman then displayed a bar chart showing the measures with the largest cost-effective resource potential. He said that the total ?technical potential? for residential space conditioning was just over 1300 aMW, of this approximately 545 aMW had a benefit/cost ratio of at least 1.0 from a total resource cost-effectiveness perspective. The chart only showed the nine largest categories of resource potential. Duct sealing in manufactured homes and heat pump conversions/upgrades in both existing and new manufactured and site built homes represent the largest areas where cost-effective space conditioning savings can be obtained.
Grist asked of all the measures in the supply curve how many where not it the Fourth Plan. After some brief calculations, Eckman said that only four of roughly 32 measure types where including in the last plan.
Several CRAC members raised the issue of whether the amount cost-effective resource potential that was potentially available from improved duct systems and from better heat pump installations was realistically achievable, given the limited availability of contractors with the skills and equipment to do this work. The group discussed the need to make the region focuses its resources for market transformation and utility programs on the areas where the largest potential exists.
Eckman concluded by reminding the CRAC that all of the data and analysis supporting these conclusions will be available on the CRAC's web page under the ?Working Papers and Background Documents link. (http://www.nwcouncil.org/energy/powerplan/CRAC/backdocs.htm) Both he and Charlie would appreciate any comments on the input assumptions and the approach used in their analysis from CRAC members.