News

Environmental Initiative is now accepting nominations for the 2016 Environmental Initiative Awards. This program annually honors projects that have achieved extraordinary environmental results by harnessing the power of partnership.

When building a new home all sorts of little details need to be decided: What color the walls will be, what the cabinets will look like, etc. Often the mechanical part of the home is given less attention. Options that cost more are easy to push off for something familiar and cheaper.

This article was originally published in Midwest Energy News by Frank Jossi.

Less than a week after a Minnesota co-op announced it had sold out shares of its formerly struggling solar garden, solar developer Sunshare announced it has sold out its first project in Waverly, a town 35 miles west of Minneapolis.

CERTs is pleased to announce that Kristi Fernholz, a Senior Planner at the Upper Minnesota Valley Regional Development Commission (UMVRDC), will also be acting as our new West Central CERT Coordinator. Kristi has worked at UMVRDC on a variety of programs since 2000.

“Advocating for renewable energy, energy efficiency and sustainability is the volunteer job I’ve been doing for several years” said Chris Meyer, who has just joined CERTs as the Southeast CERT Coordinator, “and now I’ll have an excuse to do it.

Two groups, Outsourced Innovations, a lighting consulting firm, and Tangletown Gardens, a greenhouse nursery and garden business, recently completed an 12-month study of greenhouse-specific LED lighting technology. This study was funded through a Minnesota Department of Commerce Conservation Applied Research and Development (CARD) grant.

The organization Minnesota Brownfields is hosting a session to explore the opportunities and challenges associated with developing solar energy on brownfield sites, much like the project that was completed in Hutchinson last month.

The Clean Energy Resource Teams are excited to announce 39 Seed Grant awards to organizations in the seven Minnesota CERT regions. Each region awarded around $20,000 worth of grants, catalyzing energy efficiency and renewable energy across the state. CERTs has awarded over $1 million in Seed Grants to 269 projects since 2006.

The Minnesota Legislature established the Made in Minnesota (MiM) Solar Incentive Program in 2013 to help our state meet its solar electricity standard and to catalyze the solar industry.

MiM is a solar photovoltaic (PV) and solar thermal incentive program for consumers who install PV and solar thermal systems using solar modules and collectors certified as manufactured in Minnesota.

The mission of Iron Range Partnership for Sustainability (IRPS) is to stimulate conversation and action for a sustainable future on the Iron Range of northeastern Minnesota. In keeping with their mission, the Iron Range Partnership for Sustainability is pleased to announce it’s new Community Sustainability Initiative.

For the Youth Energy Summit (YES!) program, the last few months of 2015 included two successful Fall Summits, welcoming two new YES! Coordinators, reconnecting with a YES! alumna, and more.
 

Fall Summits a success

 
The air was electric with the excitement of 240 students and coaches at the 8th annual Fall Summit, held at Saint John’s University on September 30th.

This post was originally published in Midwest Energy News by Frank Jossi.

Community solar developers in Minnesota are breathing a sigh of relief over the renewal of the investment tax credit in the recent federal budget deal.

Passed by Congress and signed by the president, the budget extends the 30 percent solar tax credit for three years before gradually decreasing it to 10 percent in 2022.

If you’re in Worthington, stop by Bob & Steve’s Holiday gas station sometime and check out the energy efficiency work they have done on the exterior and interior. The recent projects funded by PACE included LED lights, new coolers and compressors, and new HVAC. “The PACE program was introduced to us by Larry Potter at Blue Line Truck Stop says owner Bob Raudenbush.

Patricia Torkelson owns the Main Street Do Jong in Tyler, Minnesota (home of the MN Dragons Chung Do Kwan group). It’s a busy place, with Tae Kwon Do, LifeFit, and even line dancing classes. Now, thanks to Property Accessed Clean Energy (PACE) financing, people will be getting in shape under better lighting and the business will be saving money.

Solar power has never been more affordable or easier to install, and that’s why the the Midwest Renewable Energy Association (MREA) has come together with communities, solar manufacturers and installers, financing providers, and more to bring a series of Solar Power Hours to Minnesota.

Local company Innovative Power Systems will start installing solar panels along the Green Line corridor in Saint Paul, next month, adding to several other projects in the city. The developer is building the facilities on four commercial rooftops. The Green Line solar project is within the Energy Innovation Corridor, an initiative promoting sustainable energy and transportation.

This post was originally published in Midwest Energy News by Frank Jossi. One year after Xcel Energy’s community solar program was launched in Minnesota, only one project—out of more than 1,500 proposed—has been built. But the utility, as well as solar backers in the state, expect the pace to pick up significantly in the coming year.

See what we did there with the blog post title? REAP also stands for Rural Energy for American Program, a grant and loan offering from USDA Rural Development that can help farmers and rural small businesses do renewable energy and energy efficiency work.

Allina Health’s Elk River Clinic offers personalized care services for physical and mental wellness, including OB/GYN, pediatrics, audiology, and surgery. The 30,000 sqft, three-story building recently received some tender loving care of it’s own with major upgrades for energy efficiency, indoor air quality, and occupant comfort.

We’re pretty sure that winter is here, even if it’s been a bit hesitant. As the temperature drops and we turn on our heat, there are many things we can do to keep the warm air in and our heating bills down. The following no-cost and low-cost tips will help Minnesotans save energy, reduce utility bills, and keep their homes safe this heating season.

Friday the 13th turned out to be a great day in Rushford, Minnesota, home to Tri-County Electric Cooperative. After a handful of informative presentations about community solar gardens, attendees got to tour TEC’s own Renewable Ray installation.

Solar is hot, hot, hot right now in Minnesota, and we wanted to share three recent developments featured in the news this week.

Minnesota’s Pine City is a member of the GreenStep Cities Program, which is a voluntary challenge, assistance and recognition program to help cities achieve their sustainability and quality-of-life goals.

A new 30-minute program on Twin Cities Public Television (TPT) captures the importance of having an advanced home energy assessment and the big dividends to be earned from prescribed home improvements.

The program, called Improving Your Home’s Performance, takes the homeowner through the process of getting a home energy assessment, identifying problems, taking action, and measuring successes.

Results from EnergyScoreCards Minnesota, a two-year controlled experiment that included over 550 buildings, found that energy and water benchmarking work as an energy efficiency measure for multifamily buildings in Minnesota. Bright Power and its project partners discovered a 5% energy savings and 30% water savings in the second year among master-metered buildings (i.e.