The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has recognized Watauga County’s Landfill Gas-To-Energy Project for excellence in innovation and for achieving environmental and economic benefits.

Watauga County’s 186-kilowatt pilot project generates electricity by burning methane-rich gas extracted from a small, once-closed landfill in Boone. It creatively employs two retrofitted automotive internal combustion engines, and, according to the EPA, this technology had previously been used only to destroy methane from coal mine gas. The project was among seven in the U.S. recognized at the EPA’s annual Landfill Methane Outreach Program Conference, held Jan. 29–31.

The county enlisted help from many local sources. Appalachian State University’s Energy Center assisted with project management support, including student and faculty research and waste heat utilization design. Blue Ridge Electric, one of North Carolina’s electric cooperatives, also provided technical assistance from the project’s earliest stages. “Our staff has provided many services, including helping the county develop a test plan, commissioning the unit and making sure everything is working properly,” said Mike High, director of engineering services at the co-op. In particular, Blue Ridge Electric’s engineering manager Ralph Seamon spent much time serving in a technical advisor capacity, from the project’s start-up to seeing it successfully operational, High added.

The county began the endeavor as a voluntary effort in 2005?—?now the internationally acclaimed project hosts visitors from as far away as Brazil and Eastern Europe. It sells its electricity to Duke Energy and green power credits to NC GreenPower. Over its life, the project is expected to provide the county an annual profit of up to $72,000 and reduce landfill electricity costs by up to 80 percent.

By Carolina Country Magazine

Telecom giant Verizon is expected to announce on Tuesday that it plans to spend $100 million on clean power projects, including installing solar panels and fuel cells at 19 locations to help power its buildings and network infrastructure. Verizon’s Chief Sustainability Officer James Gowen plans to make the announcement at Fortune’s Brainstorm Green conference on Tuesday.

Verizon plans to buy fuel cells from ClearEdge Power and solar panels from SunPower. The amount of power from the solar panels and fuel cells, which will be installed across seven states, will be 70 million kilowatt hours of electricity. That’s enough to power 6,000 homes per year.

Fuel cells look like industrial refrigerators, and they use a chemical reaction to produce electricity and heat. They are filled with large stacks that are lined with catalysts (a metal, sometimes platinum), and a fuel (commonly natural gas) is inserted in one side and runs over the stack. Electricity and heat flow out the other side. The benefits of fuel cells are that the electricity can be created on site where it is used, and if the fuel used is biogas, then the electricity is also free of carbon emissions.

Verizon has been using a small amount of solar and fuel cell technology for awhile, but this move represents the company’s largest commitment to clean power projects to date. Verizon is looking to cut its carbon emissions footprint substantially by 2020.

Gowen told me in an interview that this initiative is being driven both by the desire to add energy resiliency to Verizon’s facilities as well as the company’s sustainability goals. During superstorm Sandy, a fuel cell installation that Verizon had in Long Island that powered a switching station (using fuel cells from UTC Power, which was acquired by ClearEdge Power) never went down. Gowen said he wanted that type of off-grid resiliency through out Verizon’s facilities.

All of the solar panel installations in 2013 will be pretty large ones. For example, Verizon is putting solar panels on the roof of a data center in New Jersey, as well as on the ground next to the data center. The return on investment for the combined clean power projects is supposed to be around ten years, said Gowen.

Deploying clean power technologies — both solar panels and fuel cells — at data centers is a growing trend for internet and telecom companies in the U.S. Apple (a AAPL), Google, eBay, and Microsoft are all deploying clean power at data centers to help add off grid resiliency, as well as lower carbon emissions.

Apple is building its own solar panel farms and fuel cell farms at its data center in Maiden, North Carolina. Google has spent over a $1 billion investing in clean power projects and recently started working with Duke Energy on a clean power initiative in North Carolina. AT&T has large fuel cell farms powering its operations in California and Connecticut, using technology from Bloom Energy.

In a call last week, ClearEdge Power’s CEO David Wright called Verizon’s commitment to clean power technology “a stake in the ground for other technology companies.”

By: GIGAOM

The Geothermal Energy Association (GEA) has released an Air Emissions Comparison and Externality Analysis showing geothermal energy provides significant benefits to public health and the environment as one of the least-polluting and most environmentally friendly forms of energy. The analysis found binary geothermal plants produce virtually no greenhouse gases (GHG) and dry steam and flash geothermal plants put out only trace amounts of emissions. It estimates the public benefits from clean energy produced in California and Nevada are worth more than $117 million annually.

“Energy production and use is a major source of environmental and public health damage, and geothermal energy is a truly remarkable resource because it harnesses the power of the Earth to produce large amounts of power with virtually no impact,” said GEA Executive Director Karl Gawell. “Geothermal has tremendous untapped potential to provide energy without adding harmful elements into the environment.”

According to the report, geothermal energy emerges as one of the least polluting and environmentally unobtrusive forms of energy, having the lowest lifecycle emissions of any generating technology. Dry steam and flash geothermal energy plants emit about 5% of the carbon dioxide, 1% of the sulfur dioxide, and less than 1% of the nitrous oxide emitted by a coal-fired plant of equal size; and binary geothermal plants produce near-zero emissions. This is advantageous to public health, since many of the pollutants released in energy production carry negatives health consequences.

Additional benefits of geothermal energy include less land degradation, air emissions and environmental harm; greater fuel diversity; and improved national security through the use of an indigenous energy source. Geothermal energy also adds to the economy by paying substantial property taxes and providing significant long-term local employment.

This analysis updates a 2005 paper published in the Electricity Journal and expands upon the methodology by incorporating more atmospheric pollutants into the calculation. The new information showed GEA researchers the benefit of producing power using geothermal sources—as opposed to fossil fuels—is worth 3.5 cents for coal, and 1 cent for natural gas per kWh. Additionally, GEA estimates geothermal provides approximately $88 million in externality benefits per year to California and $29 million to Nevadans by avoiding fossil fuel emissions.

“Geothermal energy carries a smaller environmental footprint than other energy sources, such as coal or natural gas,” said Benjamin Matek, GEA’s geothermal industry analyst and author of the updated report. “The absence of a fuel cycle reduces the impacts on transportation infrastructure, and geothermal power plants can use recycled waste water to reduce environmental impacts on water resources and treatment costs.”

The complete report is available at http://tinyurl.com/GEAExternalities. GEA will expound on this analysis at the National Geothermal Summit in Reno on June 26th to 27th. For more information on the Summit, please visit http://geo-energy.org/events.aspx.

The Geothermal Energy Association (GEA)
http://www.geo-energy.org

By: North American Clean Energy

Truckers, UPS join the lot choosing cleaner, cheaper path

The natural gas boom has already upended the American power industry, displacing coal and bringing consumers cheaper electricity.

Now the trucking industry, with its millions of 18-wheelers moving products like potato chips, deodorant and copy paper around the country, is taking a leap forward in switching from petroleum to cleaner-burning natural gas. And if natural gas remains cheap, consumers may benefit again.

This month, Cummins, a leading engine manufacturer, began shipping big, new engines that make long runs on natural gas possible. A skeletal network of refueling stations at dozens of truck stops stands ready. Major shippers like Procter & Gamble, mindful of both fuel costs and green credentials, are turning to companies with natural gas trucks in their fleets.

And in the latest sign of how the momentum for natural gas in transportation is accelerating, United Parcel Service announced last week that it is expanding its fleet of heavy 18-wheel vehicles running on liquefied natural gas, or LNG, to 800 by the end of 2014, from 112. The vehicles will use the new Cummins engines, produced under a joint venture with Westport Innovations.

UPS, like the rest of the industry, still has a long way to go in the conversion, but the company hopes to make natural gas vehicles a majority of its new heavy truck acquisitions in two years. The company is benefiting from incentives provided by various states and the federal government, which offer tax credits and grants for installing natural gas fuel stations and using vehicles fueled by natural gas.

“By us doing this it will help pave the way and others will follow,” said Scott Wicker, chief sustainability officer at UPS. “Moving into LNG is a means to get us onto what we see as the bridging fuel of the future and off of oil. It’s the right step for us, for our customers and for our planet.”

The move could also cut the country’s oil import bill. Right now, about 8 million heavy and medium-weight trucks consume 3 million barrels of oil a day while traveling the nation’s highways. That is nearly 15 percent of the total national daily consumption and the equivalent of three-fourths of the amount of oil imported from members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries.

Roughly two-thirds of the diesel used as transportation fuel nationwide feeds 3 million 18-wheelers, the main trucks hauling goods over long distances.

A slow transition

In the last four years, the natural gas shale drilling boom has produced a glut of inexpensive fuel, leading producers to argue that the country should wean its commercial and municipal transportation systems from a dependence on imported oil to domestically produced natural gas.

Waste Management driver Alan Sadler fills his truck with CNG gas at the company's filling station in Washington, Pa., last November. Some predict that years from now, motorists needing a fill-up might see natural gas pumps sharing space at the neighborhood filling station with ones dispensing gasoline and diesel.

It is cheaper, saving truckers as much as $1.50 a gallon, and it burns cleaner, making it easier to meet emissions standards. The domestic fuel also provides some insulation from the volatile geopolitics that can drive up petroleum prices.

Still, manufacturers and fleet owners have been slow to switch, partly because natural gas vehicles can cost almost twice as much as conventional trucks and because only a few gasoline stations have the specialized equipment needed to dispense the fuel.

Now, as name-brand manufacturers and chains like Nike and Wal-Mart have pressed for transportation of their goods by natural gas vehicles and companies like UPS, FedEx and Ryder System have started exploring the option, truck makers have begun bringing natural gas vehicles to the market. Major manufacturers, including Navistar and Volvo, have plans to offer long-haul natural gas vehicles.

Clean Energy Fuels – a company backed by the financier T. Boone Pickens and Chesapeake Energy – has peppered major routes with 70 stations, many at truck stops operated by Pilot Flying J. (The truck-stop company, whose chief executive is Jimmy Haslam, owner of the Cleveland Browns, is separately under investigation for potential rebate fraud.)

Clean Energy has plans to complete 30 to 50 more by the end of the year. Shell has an agreement to build refueling stations at as many as 100 TravelCenters of America and Petro Stopping Centers while ENN, a privately held Chinese company, hopes to build 500 filling stations as well.

Place to fuel few

That emerging network “really has changed the interplay between the shippers and the contracted carriers,” said Andrew J. Littlefair, Clean Energy’s chief executive. “The whole deal’s beginning to change.”

Though the network is growing rapidly, it has a long way to go. As of May 2012, only 53 LNG fueling stations were in the United States, more than two-thirds concentrated in California, along with 1,047 compressed natural gas stations around the country, according to the Energy Department. In comparison, there were 157,000 fueling stations selling gasoline.

Vehicle use of natural gas in the United States is still negligible but it has been growing. Among fleets whose vehicles travel shorter routes, like transit buses, refuse haulers and delivery trucks, use of compressed natural gas is much further along. Last year, more than half of newly purchased garbage trucks ran on compressed natural gas.

The federal Energy Information Administration last year projected that if enough LNG filling stations were built and economic conditions were right, sales of heavy-duty natural gas vehicles could increase to 275,000 in 2035, equivalent to 34 percent of new vehicle sales, from 860 in 2010. But estimates vary.

Citigroup recently forecast that 30 percent of the heavy truck fleet would shift to natural gas by the end of the decade, but some in the transportation industry put that figure much lower.

A ‘chicken-and-egg dilemma’

One obstacle is cost. There are some tax incentives, and the Obama administration funneled stimulus money to various projects. ENN, the Chinese company, for instance, has teamed up with a small company now operating as Blu in Utah that used federal stimulus money to help open a natural gas fueling station in Salt Lake City in 2011.

But industry executives say that the incentives are not enough to get the system going and solve what Bill Logue, chief executive of the FedEx Freight Corp., called the “chicken-and-egg dilemma” of which comes first, the trucks or the stations.

“We believe that public policy supporting the development of natural gas infrastructure is critical and should be prioritized,” he said in an email message. “Individual drivers and private companies cannot realistically be expected to resolve the dilemma themselves.”

Another issue arises alongside the very appeal of the fuel: its low price. Because natural gas is in demand to meet so many different energy needs – including industrial electricity and home heating – prices could rise, as they have in recent months, especially if the Obama administration begins approving the fuel for export to countries where gas commands a much higher price, as some producers and lawmakers are pressing the Energy Department to do.

By Diane Cardwell and Clifford Krauss — New York Times

PELHAM — The first thing that gets your attention is the blue — row after row of polycrystalline panels sitting atop aluminum racking gleaming in the sunlight.

From a distance, the fenced-in area could be mistaken for a body of water.

This is a farm. Its crop is the sun.

The solar farm, which is run by Chapel Hill-based Strata Solar, sits on roughly 40 acres. More than 26,000 solar panels generate 5 megawatts of AC power.

This power, enough to serve 750 houses, is sold to Duke Energy.

County Manager Lance Metzler said the solar farm, Dibrell Farm, is the first in Rockingham County. He said more farms like this are likely in the near future.

“We are looking at other sites throughout the county that might interest Strata Solar,” Metzler said.

Blair Schooff, Strata Solar’s vice president of marketing and sales, said the company is interested in developing more farms in Rockingham County.

A bluebird perches on a solar panel at the new Strata Solar solar farm in northern Rockingham county.

“We have a couple of projects lined up,” Schooff said. “We are actively interested in the area.”

Schooff said Guilford County is also on Strata Solar’s radar.

“We are looking very intensely at that whole part of the state,” he said.

They crop up quickly, no matter where they go.

Construction on Dibrell Farm began in mid-January, and it was commissioned April 5. Strata Solar leases the farmland for 20 years with a 10-year option.

The company works with the land as is and did little to no grading. When the deal ends, the panels will be removed and recycled. The land can be used for farming or whatever else the landowner chooses.

“It’s a $12 million investment in the community,” Metzler said, adding that the company spent about $250,000 in the community during construction.

It is a good source of income for the property owner. Schooff said farmers are usually eager to deal with the company.

“We have been well-embraced by the farm community,” Schooff said.

Giant solar farms are a fairly new thing, at least in central North Carolina. Companies say they need trained workers, undeveloped land, community and government support and plenty of sunshine — which the area has in abundance.

SunEdison runs a solar farm on 355 acres in Davidson County and supplies electricity to Duke Energy under a 20-year contract.

In 2011, Guilford County was one of seven finalists for what was touted as the largest solar farm in the world — a $1.4 billion project. National Solar Power of Melbourne, Fla., eventually built the farm in its home state.

But the size and scope of the project got officials in the Triad talking about solar energy as a viable economic development option for this struggling area.

National Solar Power’s five-year construction phase, for instance, would have created 400 jobs. And the $1.4 billion investment would have produced $10.9 million in Guilford County taxes.

Strata Solar works with employment and economic development offices where projects are built, and it hires and trains individuals. Its strategy is to build solar farms in regional clusters so its teams can move from one job to the next.

Where “next” is Schooff wouldn’t say, but the company isn’t finished with Rockingham County.

And there is plenty of sunshine to go around.

Reposted from the News & Record

A bill repealing incentives has already narrowly passed a House committee vote in the General Assembly.

The data comes from a report prepared for the SEA group by RTI International and La Capra Associates. The report was released in February.

Sustainable energy investments across NC (photo credit NCSEA)

The conservative think thank John Locke Foundation has challenged some of that data.

According to a county-by-county breakdown of the report, 22 counties received investments of $10 million or more.

Wake County received $36.7 million to rank sixth.

Durham County ranked 20th at $11.2 million.

Davidson County, Robeson County and Person County ranked 1-3 respectively with $110 million or more in investments.

“The data clearly shows that North Carolina’s clean energy policies are providing an economic boost in counties all around the state,” said Lowell Sachs, director of communications for the NC Sustainable Energy Association. “In addition to creating paths for future business development, these clean energy investments bring badly needed revenue that can support core functions of these communities like roads, schools, fire departments and police.”

A map released with the update documents investments by state House Districts and by county.

Written by WRALTechWire

RALEIGH, N.C. — Three North Carolina universities made this Final Four and in the end, North Carolina A&T emerged victorious.

No, this wasn’t college basketball. N.C. A&T won the the second annual ACC Clean Energy Business Plan Challenge held Tuesday at North Carolina State University. The contest had schools pitching clean energy proposals before a panel of judges comprised of energy industry representatives from companies such as ABB, Duke Energy and Siemens. A total of 10 universities presented at this year’s event.

The N.C. A&T project, presented by student Daniel Oldham, proposes turning hog waste into an adhesive that can be used in building materials and road repair. The other schools making the final four were Clemson University, Duke University and N.C. State. As the winning school, the N.C. A&T project receives $100,000 and the chance to compete in the National Clean Energy Business Plan finals.

The competition was organized by the Research Triangle Cleantech Cluster, a program of the Research Triangle Research Partnership. The public-private partnership works to promote economic development in the Triangle region.

By: WRALTechWire

GTM Research and the Solar Energy Industries Association® (SEIA®) have released the “U.S. Solar Market Insight: Year-in-Review 2012,” the definitive analysis of solar power markets in the U.S. With another record-breaking year in 2012, solar is the fastest growing energy source in the U.S., powering homes, businesses and utility grids across the nation. The Solar Market Insight annual edition shows the U.S. installed 3,313 megawatts (MW) of solar photovoltaics (PV) in 2012, a record for the industry. Perhaps most importantly, clean, reliable, affordable solar is continuing a major growth pattern that has made it a leading source of new electricity for America that’s increasingly competitive with conventional electricity across dozens of states today.

Even with the cost of solar falling for consumers, the market size of the U.S. solar industry grew 34 percent from $8.6 billion in 2011 to $11.5 billion in 2012—not counting billions of dollars in other economic benefits across states and communities.  As of the end of 2012, there were 7,221 MW of PV and 546 MW of concentrating solar power (CSP) online in the U.S. — enough to power 1.2 million homes.

“There were 16 million solar panels installed in the U.S. last year – more than two panels per second of the work day – and every one of these panels was bolted down by a member of the U.S. workforce,” said Rhone Resch, president and CEO of SEIA. “We’ve brought more new solar online in 2012 than in the three prior years combined. This sustained growth is enabling the solar industry to create thousands of good jobs and to provide clean, affordable energy for more families, businesses, utilities, and the military than ever before. This growth simply would not have occurred without consistent, long-term policies that have helped to ensure a stable business environment for this country’s 5,600 solar companies – many of them small businesses.”

At the state level, 2012 was another year for breaking records. California became the first state to install over 1,000 MW in one year, with growth across all market segments. Arizona came in as the second largest market, led by large-scale utility installations, while New Jersey experienced growth in the state’s non-residential market. The top 10 largest state solar markets in 2012 were:

1. California   1,033           6. Massachusetts   129
2. Arizona   710                 7. Hawaii   109
3. New Jersey   415           8. Maryland   74
4. Nevada   198                  9. Texas   64
5. North Carolina   132      10. New York   60

In addition to record annual installations, the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2012 shattered all-time quarterly records as well, with 1,300 MW of installed PV, besting the previous high by a whopping 64 percent. The residential and utility segments had their best quarters ever, installing 144 MW and 874 MW respectively.

“2012 was a busy year in the U.S. solar market,” said Shayle Kann, vice president at GTM Research. “The market value of U.S. solar installations reached $11.5 billion in 2012, up from just $3.6 billion in 2009. Amidst this boom, the industry faced newly-imposed import tariffs on Chinese solar cells and ongoing consolidation in the manufacturing space. In 2013, we expect another strong year, driven in part by new mechanisms to increase the availability, and lower the cost, of solar project financing.”

The residential market saw meaningful growth in California, Arizona, Hawaii, Massachusetts, and New York, as average residential system prices dropped nearly 20 percent in one year – from $6.16 per watt in Q4 2011 to $5.04 per watt in Q4 2012. SEIA and GTM Research expect residential solar to surge in 2013 and beyond, as third-party solar financing options spread across the country.

The non-residential segment, which includes commercial, governmental, and non-profit systems, installed more than 1,000 MW in 2012. Leading non-residential markets included California, New Jersey, Arizona, Massachusetts, and Hawaii.

Meanwhile, the utility market continues to be dominated by installations in the desert southwest. There were 152 utility solar installations in 2012, and eight of the ten largest projects currently in operation were completed in 2012. These installations represented 54% of total installed capacity, or 1,782 MW.

SEIA and GTM Research expect the growth to continue into 2013 and beyond. For this year, the report forecasts 4,300 MW of new PV installations, up 29 percent over 2012, and 946 MW of concentrating solar power. Over the next four years, the residential and non-residential markets are expected to gain market share as system prices decline, the industry becomes even more efficient, and new financing channels arise. “All of these data point to solar having turned the corner,” added Resch.  “Solar is an affordable option for homes and businesses today, and is well on its way to becoming a substantial part of America’s energy portfolio.”

Key Report Findings
·       PV installations grew 76% in 2012 to reach 3,313 MW

·       There are now more than 300,000 PV systems operating across the U.S.

·       The U.S. installed 11% of all global PV in 2012, the highest market share in at least fifteen years

·       Cumulative PV capacity operating in the U.S. as of the end of 2012 stood at 7,221 MW and cumulative operating concentrating solar stood at 546 MW

·       Twelve states installed over 50 MW of solar each in 2012, up from eight in 2011

·       There were over 90,000 solar installations in 2012, including 83,000 in the residential market alone

·      The non-residential segment, which includes commercial, governmental, and non-profit systems, installed more than 1,000 MW in 2012. Leading non-residential markets included California, New Jersey, Arizona, Massachusetts, and Hawaii.

·       Weighted average PV system prices fell 27% in 2012, reaching $5.04/W in the residential market, $4.27/W in the non-residential market, and $2.27/W in the utility market

The “U.S. Solar Market Insight: Year-in-Review” can be found at http://www.greentechmedia.com/research/ussmi. The 2012 report is the most detailed and timely research available on the continuing growth and opportunity in the U.S. The report includes deep analysis of solar markets, technologies and pricing, identifying the key metrics that will help solar decision-makers navigate the market’s current and forecasted trajectory.

GTM Research,
http://www.gtmresearch.com

SEIA
www.seia.org

Reposted from North American Clean Energy

This year the conference will be held in Raleigh at a time that state legislators are trying to undo a key state policy, and the first law of its kind in the South, that promotes renewables and energy efficiency.

This week’s introduction of House Bill 298, which seeks to freeze the state’s renewables and conservation mandate, will lend a sense of timeliness to panel discussions about the status of solar energy, wind farms and other renewables in North Carolina.

In Thursday’s announcement of the conference, N.C. Commerce Secretary Sharon Decker frames the debate by extolling the clean energy sector as “vaulting North Carolina into a top-tier state for clean energy jobs and lifting the entire Southeast with it.”

Speakers at this year’s 3-day sustainability conference will include Marilyn Brown, a Georgia Tech professor who worked on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and shared a Nobel Prize with former vice president Al Gore.

Other speakers will include James Ellis, electric vehicle manager for Nissan North America, maker of the Nissan Leaf electric car, and Ty Mitchell, executive vice president for Cree, the Durham-based maker of LED lighting.

Panel discussions will cover microgrids, power grid security, federal and state policies, North Carolina’s energy clusters, solar farms, offshore wind farms, biofuels and others.

The discussion of solar farms and wind farms is likely to include the fallout from House legislation introduced by Republican Mike Hager, a former Duke Energy engineer who regards clean energy mandates to be boondoggles. The state’s 2007 energy law requires that investor-owned electric utilities offset 12.5 percent of retail power sales with renewables or efficiency programs by 2021.

Hager’s bill would freeze that mandate at the current 3 percent. His bill would also prohibit power companies from paying additional incremental costs to cover the costs of renewables and efficiency programs beyond the 3 percent they have attained so far.

The 2007 law spawned a surge in solar farms, including a planned 100-megawatt project that would be one of the largest in the country. It also forced Duke Energy, Progress Energy and rural and municipal utilities to develop programs to pay customers cash incentives for buying energy efficient appliances and adopting other conservation measures.

Written by: John Murawski, Raleigh News & Observer

Research Triangle Region, N.C. – Research Triangle Region economic developers and companies have officially entered the race to make the region a leader in plug-in electric vehicle (PEV) technologies.

The Research Triangle Cleantech Cluster (RTCC) will announce today (Wednesday, March 13) the launch of a smart transportation industry focus that will capitalize on the region’s critical mass of PEV companies and research, as well as a statewide plan to make North Carolina plug-in ready from mountains to sea.

The announcement will be made at a meeting of the N.C. Plug-in Electric Vehicle Taskforce, the group that is leading the statewide effort, as it celebrates completion of its statewide PEV readiness plans. The event will be hosted by Advanced Energy, the organization that will manage RTCC’s industry engagement in smart transportation.

“Advanced Energy sees working with the RTCC to lead a smart transportation industry engagement program as one of the next logical steps for the task force to take,” said Jeff Barghout, Advanced Energy’s division director for transportation initiatives.

“The task force’s ongoing work with more than 200 organizations showed us the significant concentration of electric vehicle supply chain companies that already operate in this region. We intend to build on that work to accelerate the growth of the industry and make electric vehicles convenient for our residents to use,” Barghout said.

RTCC Managing Director Lee Anne Nance said the smart transportation focus is a natural fit with the RTCC’s rapidly maturing smart grid cluster. For example, the Advanced Transportation Energy Center, co-located with N.C. State University’s FREEDM Systems Center, is developing technologies that will help the electric power industry manage large-scale uptake of plug-in electric vehicles. The FREEDM Center, meanwhile, is conducting research that will transform the nation’s electric power grid into a smart ! grid that will manage distributed energy resources, ensure a secure communication backbone and improve efficiency.

“The center’s work is transforming the power industry in the same way the Internet transformed the computer industry from mainframe to desktop to mobile device,” Nance said. “Together, smart grid and smart transportation hold extraordinary potential for innovation and business development in our 13 counties.”

Wake County Economic Development, which leads the region’s smart grid focus, will support RTCC and Advanced Energy’s work with industry knowledge and connections, said Wake EDC project manager Michael Haley.

“Wake EDC is facilitating national and global linkages of companies, suppliers, support agencies and researchers working on smart grid innovation and business development, and the spill-over and connections to smart transportation have just naturally emerged,” Haley said. “We see this as a win-win for our business development and for our region’s quality of life as we develop the full spectrum of smart, clean technologies.”

Local industry leaders, like Scott Henneberry of Schneider Electric, agree. Schneider Electricmanufactures electric charging stations in Knightdale.

“Schneider Electric is a $30 billion global energy management leader, and electric vehicle charging stations are a growing and important part of that,” said Henneberry, RTCC board member and vice president of smart grid strategy for Schneider Electric, an RTCC founding company. “A massive deployment of electric vehicles will require a smart grid, so we see tremendous upside potential for this industry.”

The Research Triangle Cleantech Cluster is an initiative of business, government, academic and nonprofit leaders working to accelerate the cleantech economy and is led by a 10-member board of directors. The Research Triangle Regional Partnership (RTRP) formed and manages the RTCC with funding from industry members ABB Inc., Duke Energy, Field2Base Inc., Power Analytics Corp., PowerSecure International, RTI International, SAS, Schneider Electric, Sensus and Siemens. RTRP is a public-private partnership that leads economic development strategy for the 13-county Research Triangle Region of North Carolina.www.researchtrianglecleantech.org

Advanced Energy (AE) is a nationally recognized nonprofit with a mission to provide economic, environmental and societal benefits through innovative and market-based approaches to energy issues.  Established in 1980, AE has been developing innovative programs, conducting cutting-edge research and analyzing real-world effectiveness for energy issues in order to deliver tangible results with practical, sustainable solutions for customers, partners, members and the energy-using public. Located in Raleigh, N.C., AE focuses on applied building sciences in residential, commercial and industrial sectors; industrial process technologies; renewable energy; motors and drives testing; and emerging transportation initiatives (such as electric transportation). AE’s facility houses state-of-the-art laboratories, where they perform testing and applied research in all of the evolving disciplines. For m! ore information, visit www.AdvancedEnergy.org.

# # #

Contact: For more information on the RTCC, visit www.researchtrianglecleantech.org or contact Managing Director Lee Anne Nance, (919) 334-4075.