The Challenges – and Opportunities – for Modernizing HBCU Energy Services
At a time when so much of the country is transitioning to green, efficient energy systems, many if not most Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) face numerous and significant impediments to joining that movement. But in those challenges also exist opportunities which, if adequately met, could help to fuel this same energy revolution.
First, the challenges:
Financial Limits. Many HBCUs lack the financial reserves to invest in renewable energy products and services, including solar panels, modern HVAC infrastructure, and microgrids.
Aged Infrastructure. Many if not most HBCU campuses are populated with older buildings that are not energy efficient. While retrofitting these structures could cost a great deal of money and prove complicated, the energy savings and carbon offsets would similarly be substantial.
Funding Access. Although federal and local grants and incentives for renewable energy projects are available, many HBCUs lack the awareness, capacity, and internal knowhow to navigate and leverage these complicated processes.
Limited Partnerships. Many HBCUs lack the partnerships with major corporations and government agencies that can support large-scale green-energy efforts.
Geographic Challenges. Many HBCUs operate in locations that make renewable energy systems more difficult: more limited supplies of consistent sunlight, for example, or dense infrastructure where large-scale microgrid installations are more complicated and expensive.
With all that said, however, when it comes to HBCU renewable energy initiatives, opportunities also abound. Some examples:
Education and Training. At a time when the availability of skilled, competent trades people are in serious demand, the opportunity exists to implement training and mentoring programs that can provide interested HBCU students with the opportunity to learn how to design, plan, implement and maintain renewable energy systems.
Community Adoption. Because many of these technologies have largely bypassed communities in which HBCUs exist and operate, implementation of these services can prove effective both in introducing them to these populations and driving adoption.
Partnerships. While existing partnerships with HBCUs are still relatively rare, introducing efforts and programs to reduce carbon outputs, improve existing energy efficiencies, and implementing renewables could introduce opportunities for these partnerships and the many positive impacts that come with them.
Savings. While up-front costs for some of these efforts can seem prohibitive, longer-term savings can result in opportunities for these campuses to reinvest those monies in other areas of need.
In short, while HBCUs face challenges in joining the nation’s move toward a smarter, renewable energy future, opportunities exist – for the schools as well as corporations, government agencies, and other bodies – to transform these all-important institutions in ways that benefit them, their communities, and the nation.
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Federal hurdles, including onerous fees and development delays, are seriously hampering tribal nations’ efforts to implement ambitious alternative energy projects that could generate reliable power, new jobs, clean energy, and massive new economic opportunities.
Although the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) committed hundreds of billions to support clean energy initiatives across the country, a perfect storm of interconnection requirements, a high volume of complex interconnection requests, and Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) fees to remain in the development queue have all conspired to create a logjam in the system.
This has proved particularly challenging for many tribes, which are looking to alternative energy solutions,(e.g., solar, wind, and geothermal) as reliable sources of power rather than purely green power initiatives.
“Tribes are unfairly being lumped into the same pool as speculative developers,” says Brian McLaughlin, CEO of PlanitWorks. “At the end of the day, these communities simply want access to reliable power. Understandably, they’d like to take charge of their own energy destinies.”
Big Fees Are Impeding Progress
Per FERC’s Order 2023, within 14 to 30 days, all interconnection requests must be accompanied by a commercial readiness deposit of $5 million (reduced from an original $7.5 million). These fees are designed to limit speculative requests from developers that are actually unprepared to perform the work or that abruptly withdraw (the $5 million would cover withdrawal penalties).
But for most tribes, coming up with that kind of money on such short notice is all but impossible. And to reiterate, the tribes aren’t interested in speculating, they’re interested in generating reliable power.
In its August 2023 report to Congress, DOE’s Office of Indian Energy released the results of a tribal survey showing that 72% of tribes had no ownership or control of their electrical infrastructure. The survey also revealed that tribes suffered an average of 10.5 power outages per year compared to a national average of just 1.6 annual outages.
In other words, far from dabbling in speculative bidding for interconnection opportunities, the tribes simply want access to, and some modicum of control over, a reliable power source.
“If you have homes that don’t have electricity in them, do you believe that they’re really thinking about clean energy,” asks Onna Labeu, the Indigenous Power & Light Fund’s managing director and the former director of the Office of Indian Economic Development at the U.S. Department of the Interior.
Labeu added that while it’s understandable the federal government is focused on reducing emissions, it’s important to remember “there are communities that are way ahead of everybody else, but the tribal communities are significantly behind.”
Reliable Power is the Focus
Ironically, Order 2023 is designed to accelerate the approval process for interconnection requests. According to a report by the Berkeley Lab of the Lawrence Livermore Laboratory, the number of requests in recent years has exploded, most in solar, wind, and storage.
Today more than 10,000 projects (a 40% year over year increase) representing roughly 1,350GW of power generation and another 680GW of storage await approval to connect to the grid. Because part of that effort to speed up things includes the hefty fees to ward off speculative types, tribes are asking for an exemption.
“We have petitioned FERC on behalf of the tribes we serve to waive [or defer] the commercial readiness deposit … and to allow tribes to remain in the interconnection queue,” said Chéri Smith, CEO of the Alliance for Tribal Clean Energy.
She noted that large alternative energy projects are “big economic engines” that not only could produce reliable sources of energy, but also generate new jobs and other economic opportunities.
Despite what may seem like a steady drumbeat of bad news regarding electric vehicle (EV) sales and leases, the industry is actually enjoying sufficient growth to suggest it soon may achieve a 10 percent share of the domestic auto industry.
Kelley Blue Book estimates EV sales in the third quarter hit 346,309 units, reflecting a year over year growth rate of 11%. EV sales also established new volume and market share records. Even Tesla, which struggled in the first half of the year, enjoyed strong growth in Q3.
Stephanie Valdez Streaty, director of Industry Insights at Cox Automotive, acknowledged much of that growth was likely due to an aggressive slate of government and industry incentives and discounts (at 12%, industry incentives for EVs were significantly higher than the 7% offered for other vehicle types).
Electric vehicle incentives compared to the rest of the automative industry. Source: Cox Automotive
But Valdez Streaty believes that “as more affordable EVs enter the market and infrastructure improves, we can expect even greater adoption in the coming years.”
What is perhaps most important is that EV’s domestic market share climbed to 8.9% compared to last year’s rate of 7.8%, leading industry observers to believe a 10% market share may not be far off.