Air conditioners | photo by flickr user Todd Morris

You’ve heard “my body is a temple,” but how about “my house is a body?”

The wall, as the CU team of engineers and architects proposes, would use channels of advanced polymers to naturally heat or cool homes similar to how the human body regulates its temperature.

“What we are envisioning is actually having a wall that has a vascular network inside,” said Kurt Maute, an associate professor with CU’s aerospace engineering sciences department.

The team of engineers assigned think that the living wall could have commercial applications in 20 years.

To assess the efforts to limit municipal demand of energy and provide clean energy, Smarter Cities surveyed city governments about the city’s aggregate kilowatt hour consumption, top three fuel sources, whether it had completed a greenhouse gas inventory, energy conservation programs (including targets for reduced consumption) and processes to measure energy conservation. The Smarter Cities team sought advice from experts both in and outside of NRDC to develop its plan. “It was important to establish a clear and reasonable description of the factor by which the Smarter Cities team would compare cities’ performance—a description that was researchable, meaning there was comprehensive, pertinent and reliable data to collect,” says Brandi Colander, an NRDC attorney with NRDC’s Air and Energy programs and a Smarter Cities project advisor.

via American Cities Get Smart about Energy | Smarter Cities.

Xcel Energy's Colorado chief is making the rounds in Boulder.

Well, there’s not a much more boring phrase than “franchise agreement” out there, but now would be a good time to educate yourself on Boulder’s Xcel franchise agreement options (and those laid out by the City Council) and what’s going on, because a lot of energy and tax dollars are in the mix and that affects everyone — for the next 20 years. On Tuesday, City Council will decide whether or not to put the franchise agreement renewal on the ballot this year, but not before they hear a lot from the president of Xcel in Colorado:

David Eves, president and CEO of Xcel’s Public Service Co. of Colorado, is making private house calls to the nine members of the Boulder City Council, just days before the elected officials decide whether to ask voters to renew a franchise agreement with the utility.

Eves was in Boulder on Thursday for the series of meetings, which were not published as part of the city’s official calendar and were not open to the public or the media. The city is not required to give public notice of meetings that have fewer than three council members in attendance.

“I usually like to make sure these meetings are open to the public, but in this case he (Eves) requested a meeting with council members” privately, said Councilwoman Crystal Gray.

In the meetings, some Council members have questions, but from the sounds of it, they’re not getting very far with them:

Mayor Susan Osborne, Councilman George Karakehian and City Manager Jane Brautigam met as a group with Eves on Tuesday, also behind closed doors.

Brautigam said the group asked the Xcel official to reconsider a temporary extension of the existing franchise agreement.

Eves rejected the idea.

The meetings come a couple of months after City Manager Jane Brautigam went to Denver to meet with Xcel — and City Council Members Lisa Morzel and Matt Applebaum expressed some discomfort over that:

Councilwoman Lisa Morzel said she was “very uncomfortable” that the community was kept out of the “secret” discussions. There also was no public notice that Brautigam would discuss the matter Tuesday night at the council meeting.

Councilman Matt Appelbaum also said he was concerned.

“Any council member can talk to anybody, and that’s fine. … This is a little different because it’s a franchise agreement and we have a negotiating team,” he said.

The Camera reported that a recent survey indicated most Boulder voters would oppose the Xcel franchise agreement renewal and a utility excise tax on Xcel that would recoup money Boulder would lose from not renewing. So it’s not surprising that Xcel would be taking some kind of action to reverse that — or that City Council would be open to suggestions to keep itself out of a $3.9 million hole.

An employee works on equipment at Abound Solar's Longmont production facility. Courtesy photo | Abound Solar

President Barack Obama has recently announced a federal loan guarantee to Abound Solar, a Loveland-based company that has a manufacturing facility in Longmont.

The company, which employs 360 people in Colorado and manufactures thin film solar panels, will nearly double its employee base in the state, Abound Solar spokesman Mark Chen said.

He said it’s not yet clear exactly how the new jobs will break down between Abound Solar’s Longmont production facility, its headquarters in Loveland and its research lab in Fort Collins.

But he said Longmont would most likely be the biggest beneficiary since the bulk of production is done in the city. The company will be able to add two production lines to the one it already has in Longmont as a result of the loan guarantee, Chen said.

The White House said the project marks the first time this new manufacturing technology for Cadmium-Telluride panels will be deployed commercially anywhere in the world.

It will produce photovoltaic panels using an innovative process in which thin films of Cadmium-Telluride are deposited onto the glass panels, according to the White House. The technology reduces overall product costs.

Abound Solar is a member of PV Cycle, an organization dedicated to creating “truly sustainable energy solutions that take into consideration the environmental impacts of all stages of the product life cycle, from raw material sourcing through end-of-life collection and recycling.”

Learn more about the Abound Solar expansion in Longmont and the federal loan guarantee at the Camera.

-Hannah Gentry

Jimena Zamora, left, who is part of the University of Colorado Student and Community Outreach on Renter Energy (SCORE), checks the temperature of the hot water in a student house on Monday. Resident Mariko McMillan, right, watches. Photo by Marty Caivano, Camera.

In a city where there are tons of renters, it’s tough to motivate people to spend money on saving energy. That’s part of why the University of Colorado’s Environmental Center is helping students living off campus chip away at their energy bills by visiting their homes to show them how:

Hosted by CU’s Environmental Center, Student and Community Outreach for Renter Efficiency — or SCORE — teaches students living in certain Boulder neighborhoods how to lower their energy bills by making their homes more efficient through simple and inexpensive adjustments, such as using energy efficient light bulbs or setting thermostats to optimal temperatures.

Mike Kuss, part of SCORE, puts a CFL bulb into a light fixture in a student house. Photo by Marty Caivano, Camera.

Of course, since motivation is the key problem here (and we’ve heard that simply educating the masses doesn’t always do the trick), SCORE is upping the ante for bribes:

If you are a CU student living in one of these neighborhoods you can receive a free energy visit: The Hill, Goss Grove, Martin Acres, Aurora (between Arapahoe and Baseline).

You’ll also get:

• $50 worth of free energy materials
• a Cosmo’s pizza for you and your roommates*
• a chance to win $200 towards one months’ energy bills

Students living in the areas served by SCORE can sign up here. Here are a couple of highlights from a recent SCORE energy visit:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Image courtesy Jeff and Rachel Hohensee

This year, they don’t even have an energy bill. Jeff, a consultant on sustainable-living topics at Natural Capitalism Solutions, was feeling guilty about his energy-wasting home, so he and his wife set out on a two-year project that transformed it into a net-zero home–meaning it generates more energy than it uses.

They started with easy fixes like switching to CFL bulbs and low-flow showerheads, and getting an energy audit to see where air was leaking from their home. They used caulk and insulation foam to fill the leaky areas.

From the Daily Camera:

Eventually, they hired insulators to add materials to the home’s walls. Jeff says they took the process to a higher level by hiring someone from Standard Renewable Energy to follow the insulators with an infrared gun. The infrared photos would show areas where the initial insulation was too sparse, and more was added.

All the home’s appliances were upgraded to Energy Star-rated models. (The new refrigerator has twice the capacity of the old one, and uses less energy, Jeff notes). They replaced old propane stoves with wood-burning stoves and added a solar water-heating unit to pre-heat water going into their water heater.

The most visible change is the addition of a large array of solar panels on the home’s exterior. The final part of the project was to replace the exterior doors and windows with high-tech, energy-efficient versions made by Serious Materials in Boulder. The final window was installed in November.

The Hohensees used $35,000 out of pocket, a ClimateSmart loan for roughly $25,000, and tax breaks and rebates to finance the retrofit project, which cost $125,000, according to Jeff.

Read the full story at DailyCamera.com or find out more about green building.

–Lindsay Gulisano

Did you even know that Boulder had a 73-year-old hydroelectric turbine?

Boulder’s looking at upgrading its aging hydroelectric turbine in Boulder Canyon, but even with a federal discount, it would cost the city about $4 million. That debate breaks down into a pretty easy-to-understand $4-ish million now or probably $5.2-ish million later — and City Council will address that tomorrow (Tuesday) night at 6 p.m.

But if the city upgrades (and scores the additional projected 30 percent in energy production), it would still have to navigate the murky waters of carbon credits. Right now, the city forks over its carbon credits to Xcel, (which allows the city to sell its energy to Xcel at higher rates). In the future, the city could keep the credits and count them against its own carbon footprint, which is of special interest because the city has committed to meeting Kyoto goals. (Remember Kyoto?)

From the Camera:

Boulder Mayor Susan Osborne said she recognizes the practical benefits of allowing Xcel to keep the carbon credits, but the council needs to have a more in-depth conversation about how to deal with renewable energy credits, whether it’s from hydroelectric projects or community “solar gardens.”

“If we’re going to talk to our residents about meeting our Kyoto goals, we ought to have some way of counting these credits that Boulder taxpayers have paid for,” she said. “It’s important to remember that this infrastructure has been bought and paid for by the citizens of Boulder.”

Read more about Boulder’s carbon credit conundrum, or check out the meeting Tuesday at 6 p.m. at Boulder Municipal Building, council chambers, 1777 Broadway.

Mmmm... rate hikes. | Flickr user Pink Sherbet Photography

Xcel applied to the Public Utilities Commission to raise rates and, to justify a rate hike, included some questionable financial items, according to the Denver Post:

Company-provided noshes at Xcel Energy — coffee, tea, bottled water, bagels and doughnuts — came to about $173,000 last year.

The utility’s Colorado unit included that sum, along with $307,000 for employee-recognition awards and parties, in its application to the state Public Utilities Commission for a $182 million rate increase.

Not so fast, said PUC officials. The costs … “are not appropriate to charge ratepayers and should be absorbed by PSCo’s shareholders.”

Bad news is, the doughnuts didn’t account for much of the total costs that Xcel sent over for a rate hike, so you’re still getting it. Get the whole Xcel donut rate hike story at the Post. Or you can spend your Friday speculating as to how much of the proposed (and forsaken) solar rate increase would have been donut-related.

More fun with utilities on BigGreenBoulder:

Utility exec: Too many hybrids could blow up the grid!

Xcel finishes building Boulder’s smart grid