DRAFT September 28, 2017 Medfield Energy Committee Meeting minutes

Attendees: Fred Davis, Jerry McCarty, Marie Nolan, Lee Alinsky and Cynthia Greene

1. Meeting minutes from June 7 were reviewed.  Fred requested a change to the recusal information.  It was noted that since the minutes there is new information about the Blake Middle school hot water heater.  Minutes were accepted and Lee will determine who should receive them at Town Hall so that they are posted on the Medfield Town Website and he will post them on the MEC google docs.
2. Update on Blake – DOER said that Blake Middle School domestic hot water heater ASHRAE audit for $7,875 is not needed.
3. We discussed who was officially on the Committee and what constituted a quorum. Lee will check in with Town Hall to determine.
4. Google documents – Lee could not manipulate the documents. Marie will look at how to give Lee administrative rights.
5. LED street lights. Fred Davis emphasized that he has recused himself from a specific bid on the LED street lights for Medfield, but he is allowed to help advise us on the process, but not the purchase.

Jerry gave us an email from Light Smart with the status on the project

• The field audit has been completed
• Looking at preliminary design
• Expect a document with the preliminary design in a week.
• At the next meeting the committee has to approve whether to go with MAPC and receive a 30% incentive from DOER (for Medfield that is $22,400) or to go through an independent process. Light Smart indicated that if we went independently it would be faster as MAPC is doing bundling of town requests.

Fred Davis explained that the process at the MAPC is evolving, that DOER thinks that bundling is better.  The faster we do the work the more time for savings.   The estimated annual savings for the Medfield project is $32,600.  Unless we were significantly delayed (10months or more) it is more cost effective to go with MAPC, although we do not know how much transactional costs there will be with MAPC vs going independently with Light Smart.

The Town must decide on the types of lights and fixtures.   There are two kinds of lights being sold now.   In the past the lights were 5,000 Calvin that emitted a blueish light.   The options now are for 3,000 Calvin, a warmer, yellower light or 4,000 Calvin a neutral, but blueish light.   Medfield could do a pilot as was done in Cambridge and Northampton, to see which light color the community members like.  The way to do this would be for committee members to observe and then let the community know and take opinions.   Northampton did this, but the results were not conclusive.  We also discussed that Westwood and Cambridge have smart controls on their lights, but that is more upfront costs.   Westwood and Cambridge have 4,000 Calvin lights.   Both lights are the same price.

Cambridge video  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xq2nATNFW7M

Fact sheet  http://www.cambridgema.gov/~/media/Files/electricaldepartment/LED-Conversion-Fact-Sheet_FINAL.pdf

Website http://www.cambridgema.gov/Departments/Electrical

Northampton http://www.northamptonma.gov/1706/LED-Streetlights

6. Green Communities.  Jerry handed out an email received on 9/26/17 with questions from DOER on our May submittal.   Jerry and Axum Teferra, from MAPC, will be discussing the comments.  Jerry will then take the questions to RISE Engineering.  We do not know how long RISE will take to answer and then for DOER to approve the answers and the project.  Jerry will discuss with Axum the timeframe on spending these funds.   The funds have to be spent before the town can apply for further Green Communities grants.  The cost of the retro commissioning for the energy management systems is $117,000 for both schools.   The grant is for $138,000.  Jerry has a $70K request in the Capitol budget  for new software to replace the 1996 version that is currently running in the schools.
7. DPW roof. Jerry has a contract with Solect engineers to look at the roof and to see if it is structurally adequate for PV.  The engineer’s site visit is next week.  Once Jerry has their report he will give it to the Building inspector to see if the roof is viable for a solar installation or it first would need modifications.
8. Public safety building. The PV system is up and running.  The dashboard is being worked on.  We will try to meet at the public safety building so we can see the dashboard.

Future Work for the committee.   Lee outlined some of his ideas and others added ideas and all were discussed.

9. Microgrids for the town buildings.   Cynthia explained that microgrids cannot cross public ways in MA, but that the hospital development might be a good location for a microgrid.  There are state incentives for microgrids.  We all want to be better educated on microgrids.

Sources https://www.energy.gov/articles/how-microgrids-work

http://www.microgridinstitute.org/about-microgrids.html

https://ilsr.org/report-mighty-microgrids/

MA microgrids http://www.masscec.com/microgrids

10. Use of the landfill site for PV array.  Lee would like us to get MA DEP’s current advice on this as Solar Design has already given us specifications for an array at this location.  If a study is needed to determine the adequacy of the landfill closure for PV, we could investigate if we could use the Green Communities funds to do the study.
11. Solar canopies at the Middle and High School parking lots with EV charging stations. The town could potentially take advantage of the EV charging station incentives.  Fred suggested that we invite the energy managers from Westwood and Wayland to speak with us as they have done a lot of work in energy improvements, Wayland doing them all at once including PV at their town hall parking lot.  We discussed other places with parking lot PV canopies – REI, Walden Pond, and Logan Airport.

Walden Pond http://www.mass.gov/eea/agencies/dcr/conservation/planning-and-resource-protection/projects/walden-pond-visitor-center-project.html

Lincoln http://www.lincolntown.org/DocumentCenter/View/26877

12. Net Zero planning. Fred Davis would like us to consider this at a future meeting.   There is a MAPC Oct 11 meeting on getting to net zero and a 45 minute MAPC webinar.  Concord passed a net zero article at their Town Meeting.

Concord http://www.concordma.gov/DocumentCenter/View/1604

Meeting adjourned 9:15 pm.

Next meeting – Tuesday Oct 17 at 7:30 pm (hopefully at the Public Safety Building.)

Respectfully submitted by Cynthia Greene