Learn More About New CALGreen Regulations At Fresno State Event

California's building code is tighter and more environmentally friendly in 2011 thanks to mandatory requirements effective Jan. 1 under the state's new CALGreen program.

The new code includes rules for, among other things, water conservation, indoor air pollution, and construction waste, and will apply to residential and commercial properties. The Center for Sustainable Energy has more information here, state officials have a recap here, and this is a 181-page guide.

The new provisions are intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by as much as 3 million metric tons by 2020, and to cut energy and water use. To help prepare industry officials, Dave Walls, executive director of the California Building Standards Commission, will headline an all-day forum on CALGreen on Jan. 28 at California State University, Fresno.

The event will be from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. in room 2206 in Henry Madden Library. The forum will be limited to 60 people balanced between building officials, design and construction professionals. The event is free, however firms are encouraged to donate $250 to help co-sponsor the program. Checks should be made out to "Fresno State Construction Management."

RSVP is required. Register at www.csufresno.edu/engineering/sustainability/ by Jan. 14.

E-mail cm.csufresno@gmail.com for information.

photo image by paravanarchitects.blogspot.com

Green energy may take big strides in 2011

Extracting energy from waste and significant moves by BP, Shell and Chevron into renewables will be among the big green stories for 2011, says a Seattle-based investment bank.

Cascadia Capital LLC also said in its annual clean-tech forecast that Congress will discard a cap-and-trade proposal on pollutants and that high oil prices will generate increased investment in natural gas, which has seen resurgence from new techniques unleashing major reserves.

“Energy policy and sustainable technologies continue to draw significant debate from consumers, pundits, politicians and investors around the world,” said Michael Butler, Cascadia chairman and CEO, in a statement. “In 2011, the energy landscape will be marked by significant investment activity from oil companies, M&A (mergers and acquisitions) of renewable energy companies, and the introduction of new technologies for transforming waste to energy. These markets will continue to draw a great deal of attention as oil prices continue to rise and the formation of a national energy policy is thrust back into the spotlight.”

In the newspaper business, where I spent 24 years of my life before this assignment, we'd all be rushing around about this time of year to get two things together.

One would be a summary of the year's top stories. The other would be a story that focused on what was expected to happen in the new year, much like what Cascadia has done here.

Every reporter was expected to collect and report on everything on his or her beat, or subjects covered. Most of us hated the task, grumbling the entire time. Our point? We'd already been covered those topics. "It's old news," we'd say. And the forecasts? We believed they were usually too general and be of little use, much like picking the Superbowl lineup a year in advance.

Our wrap stories would run on A1 during the holidays -- traditionally a time when news slows to a near stop. We'd recycle the best photos and frequently get the photogs to work up photo pages inside.

Of course, now I look upon it all fondly. And to an editor, tying up loose ends and looking ahead make sense. Back when I worked at the now deceased Anchorage Times in the early 1990s, I'd come up with the big fisheries story that would include a forecast of the salmon runs and the crab catch in the Bering Sea. Those were the big money stories and of interest to me since my grandfather, Lowell Wakefield, was one of the industry's pioneers.

At the Skagit Valley Herald, overlooking the tree-studded Puget Sound, my big stories would be farming, timber and the environment's battle with sprawl. When I went into editing full time and overseeing reporters, my subjects expanded to include crime, health care and in the Tri-Cities, the lovable Hanford nuclear site.

Now my scope has narrowed again, and I write mostly about green energy, tossing in somewhat relevant personal observations every now and then. And the traditions of my past encourage me again to cite my big stories and issue a forecast.

For the San Joaquin Valley, the top green news, at least from my perspective, has got to be energy efficiency. The Valley received a bundle from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act in 2009, and while much of it remains unspent, the allocations will prove invaluable in reducing energy costs to jurisdictions.

Here at the SJVCEO, we've had significant delay getting Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant money spent for the 39 cities and counties our nonprofit represents. Most of the hurdles are bureaucratic and require seemingly endless administrative solutions and reports.

However, looking into my crystal ball I see our fortunes changing early next year. I see work getting done and that money getting spent.

In other green Valley news, 2010 was big in getting wind and solar projects moving forward. The golden eagle has slowed wind projects and tortoises messed with some solar efforts, but we expect some to soldier on and connect with the grid. Perhaps waste-to-energy projects at dairies and other biomass efforts will get the green light.

I'd like to say I had a clue about green jobs, but I don't. Like many across the country, I experienced an economy-related layoff. I watch as my beloved newspaper industry continues to contract. I would like to see green energy innovation provide a bright spot.

Will it happen in 2011? One can hope.

Green Building Is Growing In United States

Green building is accelerating in the United States, even in this down economy. According to the Las Vegas Business Press and McGraw-Hill Construction, one-fourth of all construction in 2010 will fall into the "green" category - an increase of 50% over the last two years.

"It's an amazing area of opportunity at time when the construction market is extremely challenged," McGraw-Hill Vice President Harvey Bernstein said in the story.

Going green can increase returns almost 10%, which is an incentive, McGraw-Hill said. The green mandate is increasingly being seen on commercial construction, particularly health care and government.

That's certainly good news and could foreshadow what could come when construction picks up as the economy improves.

Green jobs? Heck yes, workers say

Those on the unemployment line aren't the only ones hoping for a break.

Many who are out of work or have had to take anything the job market has had to offer these past two years are hunting and/or daydreaming about a better position and future. And all this tepid economic news about a slow recovery -- coupled with almost daily reports of growing fallout by shadow foreclosure inventory and about 25 percent of U.S. homeowners under water on their mortgages -- doesn't help.

The recession-plagued economy has elevated interest in so-called green jobs, especially when a number of reports tout the up-and-coming sector's influence. Yet when these forecast jobs materialize and what they will look like remain as hazy as the view from Fresno to the Sierra Mountains. (For those who haven't gotten the opportunity to see what I'm referring to, let's just say it's very hazy and sometimes muddy.)

San Francisco-based research and advisory firm Clean Edge Inc. offers some clarity and digestible information with its report "Clean Tech Job Trends 2010." Company co-founder Ron Pernick, senior editor Clint Wilder and research associate Trevor Winnie summarize and gather data from other reports and bring their own findings to plot out a fairly optimistic view of the future of clean tech in the realms of wind, solar, water, materials and transportation.

"There are many challenges facing the sector, but clean energy and more broadly, clean tech, offer some of the largest growth opportunities on the global economic horizon," they write.

Clean Edge carves the market into four parts: energy, transportation, water and materials. Energy includes everything from wind, biomass and the smart grid. Transporation includes battery technology, trains, hybrids and hydrogen. Water includes recovery and capture, drip irrigation and energy efficient desalination. Materials includes bio-based materials, green chemistry and building materials and reuse and recycling.

The list is diverse and the job requirements even more so. But promise radiates from every sector.

Clean Edge says its research shows that "the solar photovoltaic industry alone now represents approximately 300,000 direct and indirect jobs globally, while the wind-power sector includes more than 500,000 direct and indirect jobs worldwide."

Not bad. It also cites reports that say Ireland, Denmark and Great Britain are on track to receive about 40 percent their electricity from renewable sources by 2025, following the lead of Portugal which reportedly is to reach 45 percent this year.

Of course, all this comes with a downside. Renewables -- at least on their face and not including all the damage done by greenhouse gas emissions -- cost more than fossil fuels. Without government assistance, they can fall flat. For instance, Spain -- a leader in solar -- is reportedly pulling subsidies, or feed-in tariffs, for renewables, threatening the future of many new projects and others countries are doing the same to a lesser degree.

And in the blogosphere, the issue has generated controversy. A comment on a greentechmedia.com story about incandescent bulb plants disappearing got this from a responder calling him or herself John Galt: "A set of technologies and products created at great cost to solve a problem that had already been solved (generating electricity), at costs considerably higher than the costs of the technologies they seek to supplant? My 12 year old daughter knows that’s a losing business proposition."

Environmental strategist and author Andrew Wilson says the debate over green jobs is far more nuanced than simply focusing on solar panel installers. He writes in HuffingtonPost.com that the international job market is facing a choice of decline or prosperity, with fossil fuels comprising the former.

"Oil is basically at peak production globally, and coal plants are nearly impossible to build in the U.S. anymore," Wilson writes. "Even as the world demands more energy, and even as fossil fuel production continues, these companies will continue to get more efficient with labor. So don't count on the fossil guys to create new wealth and jobs."

Wilson and Clean Tech point to a future of green-related jobs over a wide array of industries, linked only by concept. The mainstays, solar and wind, will provide positions but the multiplier effect comes from the spin-offs, the related support and supply jobs.

"There are more subtle shifts in labor going on as companies that did one thing in the old economy are finding their skills useful in the new one," Winston writes. He cites the case of an oil-patch cable company laying undersea electrical transmission lines for offshore wind turbines.

Pernick and Wilder at Clean Edge acknowledge clean tech needs assistance from government. They called for five national policies and initiatives they believe could play a critical role in ensuring clean-tech growth and job creation.

The first is requiring that a certain percentage of power generation come from renewables. The others were supporting green infrastructure development, enforcing emissions rules, establishing green banks, bonds and funds and implementing carbon taxes.

So what's it mean? Clean Tech's report listed the top metro areas with clean tech job activity. At Nos. 1 and 2 were San Francisco and Los Angeles. Boston came in at No. 3, with New York, Denver and Washington, D.C. filling out the top six. And the salaries aren't bad.

"A new green economy is just that -- a whole new economy, with job openings at all skill levels, from truck drivers to inventors of new battery chemistry," Winston says.

And someday soon something might just pop up on Monster.com for you.

Study: San Joaquin Valley Has Potential for 100,000 Local Clean Energy Jobs

MERCED -- Renewable energy projects slated for the San Joaquin Valley could bring more than 100,000 jobs to the area, according to a new study by UC Merced Professor Dr. Shawn Kantor.

The study, "The Economic Opportunity from Clean Energy Jobs in California's San Joaquin Valley," calculates job creation from two of the Valley's most significant industries including planned and pending-approval renewable energy projects and the high-speed rail system. Jointly, these two industries are expected to create as many as 103,510 new production and construction jobs right here in the San Joaquin Valley. Production jobs are defined in the study as long-term, while construction jobs are limited-term.

"Taken together, clean energy and high speed rail have the potential to fundamentally change the trajectory of economic development and job creation in the San Joaquin Valley," said Kantor, professor and County Bank Endowed Chair in Economics at University of California, Merced, author of the study. "The San Joaquin Valley is keeping pace with other regions by creating just as many jobs to support a clean energy economy in California."

The report, issued by the California Business Alliance for a Green Economy, explains that the San Joaquin Valley is well positioned to attract jobs in the clean energy sector – three jobs for every one job created by the high-speed rail system. The transition to cleaner energy sources is expected to bring economic growth to the region, supporting cleantech as well as traditional business.

Valley renewable energy projects analyzed in the study include Hydrogen Energy California (HECA) in Kern County, Bioenergy in Fresno, Madera Power in Madera, DTE Energy Services in San Joaquin County, Eurus San Drag in Kings County, and SPS Alpaugh in Tulare County, among others.

"This report illustrates that a healthy and prosperous future for the Valley, and all of California, depends upon a clean, green and efficient economy," said Susan Frank, coordinator for the California Business Alliance for a Green Economy. "As these Valley-based jobs are created, that will translate into a boost in the bottom line for the many small, mainstream businesses providing products and services for the clean tech sector."

According to the author, the major economic waves that have swept across California in recent decades, such as biotechnology and computer technology, have largely bypassed the San Joaquin Valley. Meanwhile, the emerging clean technology sector is creating jobs at an equal pace with other regions of the state. For example, statewide employment in clean energy grew from 117,000 to 159,000 from 1995 to 2008 (36%), while San Joaquin Valley employment increased by 48% over the same period (Next 10: Many Shades of Green, 2009).

Further, the San Joaquin Valley is expected to produce 10% of California's renewable energy within the next ten years once all pending biomass, solar, hydrogen and wind energy projects come online, with the majority of job creation coming from solar.

"The best part about it is that the renewable energy industry is bringing jobs to our community. These jobs are coming to California because of clean energy policies that make us a leader in the nation," said Tom Cotter, Central California sales manager for Real Goods Solar and member of the California Business Alliance for a Green Economy.

"In fact, Fresno is well positioned to be a leader in this effort. We have skilled workers, university resources and an unlimited supply of entrepreneurial spirit." Cotter is co-founder of Green Fresno and is the organizer of Fresno Solar Tour, part of the National Solar Tour, the largest annual grassroots solar event in history.

Based on projections from the California High-Speed Rail Authority, an estimated 24,000 construction jobs will be created in the San Joaquin Valley to build the rail network in the region. The high-speed rail network and strong renewable electricity standards (33% by 2020) are included in the plan to meet the goals of the state's landmark clean energy law (AB 32).

The report is available online .

The California Business Alliance for a Green Economy is a network of more than 930 small, mainstream businesses and business associations around the state who believe that a healthy and prosperous future for California depends on a clean, green and efficient economy. The California Business Alliance for a Green Economy supports the implementation of California's clean energy policies, including AB 32, through the adoption of standards and programs by the California Air Resources Board and other public agencies.

Visit us at www.ca-greenbusinessalliance.com.

Contact: BreAnda Northcutt, (916) 446-1955


SOURCE California Business Alliance for a Green Economy