If what happens on the coasts of the U.S. helps set trends in culture and business, then perhaps this week I witnessed in New York some of what the rest country will experience before too long. The Advanced Energy 2009 conference on Long Island, N.Y. was all about renewables, reducing carbon emission, building the smart grid and the investments in people, resources and technology to make it all work. In short, not an easy task in any state, but one that has the densest population in the country, to renewable resources distant from load centers.

 

As in any forum about of this kind, the phrase “energy independence” rings out rather regularly, and not just in the context of Mideast oil. The deputy secretary of energy for New York State said the state is about to release its long-awaited energy plan next month. Count this as a little-known fact, with big-time power implications: “New York imports 95 percent of the natural gas it uses but sits on one of the largest deposits in the country in the Marcellus shale fields,” Tom Congdon says. The fields straddle the Pennsylvania border and newer technologies make it accessible, but environmental questions dog rapid or extensive development, as either a heating source or as a bridge fuel before widespread adoption of renewable energy occurs. He also worries about the how to build out transmission, “The energy infrastructure has to be brought in line with where we’re going in our clean energy economy.”

 

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s energy czar, if you will, Jim Gallagher, outlined the challenge of the PlaNYC from 2007 to reduce carbon emissions by 30 percent below 2005 levels. With 4,000 buildings to retrofit – and that’s just city-owned property – for energy efficiency gains and to reduce consumption while anticipating an additional 1 million residents, the pricetag comes in at $2.5 billion.

 

And any green New York energy policy has to include extensive wind projects in northern and western parts of the state. The New York State Transmission, Assessment and Reliability (STAR) study is addressing that. “We need and effective use of capital to expand and modernize the grid…with enough capacity to integrate renewable,” said Carl Meyer, president of Central Hudson Gas & Electric. Not an easy task when regulations discourage cost-sharing when the presumed beneficiaries are hundreds of miles from the generation sites.

 

But there are hopeful signs, said Tom Peterson, president of Climate Strategies. His company has helped or is helping to develop “climate actions plans” for 22 states (even coal country Kentucky is a recent client). He advocates a “bottom-up” approach, driven by stakeholders to assess economic impacts, energy use and greenhouse gas mitigation. But Connecticut was the first state client, beating New York.