GI Energy has gained a lot of experience in distributed energy development — particularly when it comes to stakeholder requirements — over the 15 years it has worked in energy infrastructure.
The company shared this knowledge through case studies presented at Microgrid 2018. Topics included: the Parkville Microgrid (Hartford, Ct.), San Francisco Naval Shipyard Eco-Grid, Con Edison Energy Storage Demonstration Project (New York City), and Cornell Tech (Roosevelt Island, N.Y.).
Dave Yanni, chief development officer at GI Energy, outlined how these projects provide a range of benefits for the environment, energy resiliency and health, as well as reduce costs for maintenance, capital and operations.
- The San Francisco Naval Shipyard is a master planned site that covers 800 acres for residential, commercial and municipal use. The site will be also be home to a 450,000 gallons-per-minute water recycling system, a 10-15 MW rooftop PV system, and a 15,000 ton capacity geothermal heating and cooling system.
- The Cornell Tech Geothermal System on Roosevelt Island, N.Y., touts heat pump technology for the 150,000 square foot Bloomberg Center.
- The Parkville microgrid in Hartford, Ct., is 800 kW when running parallel with the grid and 600 kW when in microgrid-mode. Power generation technology include Bloom Energy Servers (4 ES5 fuel cells x 200 kW) and one uninterruptable power module (UPM).
He also focused on what’s ahead for microgrid markets. Capital markets are chasing investment opportunities in renewable and sustainable energy, according to Yanni. And large corporate institutions, private equity, infrastructure funds, venture capital and institutional investors are all interested.
As for what type of agreements are available for consideration, these include power and water purchase agreements, long-term capital leases, service and use fees ties to HOAs, thermal energy management agreements, subscription-based, user-funded models and more.
Public private partnerships or PPPs are also available to microgrid developers — a tool which helps pay for infrastructure that maintains competitive energy prices.
Download the full GI Energy presentation on distributed energy development.