WSRL PURPA Page

WSRL.ORG / Rural Colorado Energy Issues - July. 2005 - Revised November 2007 - Page 1

The Public Utilities Regulatory Policy Act (PURPA) was developed in an attempt to accomplish five specific objectives relative to energy suppliers. I have listed each area on this page as a separate item. Each item includes commentary with links to specific references. Because this is a rural topic website, the focus will be primarily on REA organizations. This page is also somewhat keyed to an excellent slide show document (in terms of content not necessarily intent) on PURPA created by the legal side of the National Rural Electric Cooperative Association. The act has been described as not having any real teeth and from my observation does not contain either adequately detailed or sufficiently concise definitions of terms. Delta Montrose Electric, the REA who's service territory I am in, has done a really magnificent job in my view of avoiding the real intent of the act while keeping the public largely uninformed as to the real issues.

DMEA PURPA Implementation Notice Letter (Clean Air Act) 2/25/09 -

It looks like good old DMEA is going through the motions again trying to look like a good citizen. As detailed on this page, they blew PURPA off last time as unnecessary and unwanted and I suspect they will do the same this time. In this case, I can't totally blame them. The 2007 Act was created by the disastrous Bush administration, contained a number or errors and really didn't solve the basic problems. I would like to think that Dr. Chu, new Energy Secretary, will quickly create a credible and usable replacement document and policy. In the mean time, nothing much has changed at DMEA. The " All Requirements Contract" appears to be fully in force which means DMEA will be getting the majority of their energy from old technology coal instead of a more reasonable and long term source. For those interested, links are to the right. For those interested in my favorite solution to the use of old technology coal please viste my nuclear page and the three new links at the top of the right hand links section. My personal reply to their mailing can be found here.

Net Metering, Slide Show Slide No. 17 -

Beware that there have been and are on-going studies related to the topic of providing energy from a central power station vs. using a system of distributed generation to meet energy needs. Distributed generation can take on many forms but one significant form being looked at is the use of gas powered heat pumps for both residential and industrial applications. This aligns with the concept of Combined Heat and Power (CHP). Net Metering essentially turns what has been only a one-way (towards the customer) metering system into a two way system where metered power flows are accounted for and allowed in both directions. TriStates's so called "All Requirements Contracts" does not allow for significant distributed generation operation by the member REA's. It may turn out that CHP distributed generation, with it's inherently very high fuel efficiency values, will represent very significant savings to rate payers.

Smart Metering - Real Time Pricing - Slide No. 19 -

Consistent with the Net Metering item above, there is the need to develop an advanced metering function that includes all of the metering quantities necessary for two-way metered operation and make those metered values available to both buyer and seller both in real time and for monthly billing cycle purposes. Where significant exchanges of energy occur, relatively fast communication channels to both the buyer and seller will be important.

Fuel Diversity - Slide No. 21

Again, this fits well with the concept of CHP and distributed generation. The bottom line is to get away from the very inefficient (33%) old coal, central station technologies and into technologies where virtually 90+% fuel conversion efficiency in the norm. Renewables, are, of course, also part of this picture.

Fossil Generation Efficiency - Slide No. 23

This should be obvious. With global warming and as stated above, old and inefficient fuel conversion technologies (mostly coal related) must go and be replaced with something much better.

Distributed Generation (DG) Interconnection - Slide No. 25

What can I say. Economic and environmental considerations may eventually spell a greatly decreased or even an end of centralized power production. This may occur a lot faster than you might imagine. The rather massive cancellation of projects in Kansas and Colorado and the attacks on existing construction projects in progress in Colorado point to this possible conclusion.