Article 33 – Concord Town Meeting, 2012

Greenhouse reduction and leadership

How can we make Concord’s best contribution to a greener future?

Particularly, what bold leadership thinking might elevate us to the tradition of America’s early, great environmentalist, our own Mr. Thoreau? To make our small, nonetheless consequential, dent in the otherwise dire prospects from global warming.

Conservation – the simple reduction in the use of energy – is the most effective, informed folks agree.  Our Light Plant has diligent programs to support conservation in Concord. After conservation – when we deploy the Light Plant’s considerable staff resources proactively to secure bulk electricity supplies, beyond just purchasing electricity – what is most effective?

Our first step is to be clear about the basis on which we ask the Light Plant staff to proceed.

We let the main goal be our guide, of course: To reduce greenhouse impacts. That introduces opportunity for some leadership thinking. For proactive projects to secure bulk sustainable electricity supplies, our two main choices in Concord are wind and solar power. Numerous studies show that, today, wind power reduces about twice the greenhouse impact, per dollar required – with wind today, solar probably later, we meet our goal.

How could Concord initiate its own wind power? A century ago, our forebears realized we should supplement our water supply; they went out of town to acquire rights in Nagog pond. Relevant wind resources in New England are concentrated along mountaintops, which are also outside our town. A few decades from now, most those locations will have wind installations on them ­– benefitting those with prescient and bold enough thinking to go there, parallel to a century ago and securing a water supply.

Such wind installations, besides serving our parochial interests, also make our best contribution to reduce greenhouse impacts. Is this feasible?

New England, as a region, is particularly focused on wind power for sustainable sources (rather than on solar) – with a developer community ready to partner with us. The Light Plant presently buys wind power, as a customer. Our experience with that current contract illustrates we can do our own proactive wind projects at competitive costs.

In fact, are passive purchases of wind power enough? Should we otherwise put our staff resources on solar, for the proactive work?

If the failed Article 64 solar array, voted at the 2010 Town Meeting, had proceeded, we almost certainly would be paying much more than, for instance, a solar project initiated just a couple years later, today. The price of solar is declining – a rush to solar is not a fiscally prudent step at the present. Nor is northerly New England an obvious place for solar. Though buying the WR Grace land (if we can be assured about the liabilities), is surely smart. Then there would be place for solar – if and when solar does become competitive with wind for greenhouse reduction. And the WR Grace land is useful for other purposes, no matter what.

In our quest, we want our town staff, our most precious resource, focused on the main goal. We want the proactive projects, where they put their time, to reduce greenhouse impacts most effectively – which today is wind power projects. In the future, hopefully solar costs decline far enough so we can justify solar also.

To establish this leadership position, we have opportunity for a new day in how we proceed as a town.

The Article 64 failure, over the couple years from 2010, needlessly consumed going-on a thousand hours, from some of our most senior and best people. It set back Concord’s potential contribution to a greener future by a couple years. It did not even inquire what would be Concord’s best contribution to greenhouse reduction, instead proceeded only from an unvetted dollars-and-cents distraction.

The roles of the main actors in this, the Light Plant board, the Selectmen, Concord’s Sustainable Energy committee, can instead – with new, bold thinking – transform into leadership.

We could be proud of our leadership. Rather than wondering why they rush into more solar, without the promised dialog across town on land use. Before they have acknowledged the failures of the past couple years. Most consequentially, before asking what will make Concord’s best contribution to green. And after even earlier, similar failures in the Morgan Stanley episode, which unfortunately pushed up Light Plant rates, because of losses incurred from speculating in a highly volatile market.

Team Kermit in Concord looks forward to this renewed leadership, from our neighbors entrusted to these positions.

Shortly here online, we will have the outlines of a prospective real wind project that Concord might do – you can ‘kick the tires’ a little, to discover this is all quite practically possible, actually.

At Town Meeting, we hope you will come and listen carefully to the discussion of Article 33.

Team Kermit