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HG&E
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involved in some way, shape, or form in this effort,” Lavelle noted. “Our team is really engaged, and it’s good to see how passionate people are about work- ing toward this objective and how creative they are.”
The latest example of this passion and creativity is the Mount Tom Energy Storage System. Operated by ENGIE Storage (formerly Green Charge Net- works), it is designed to keep electric rates stable by reducing rising demand-based charges for HG&E and its customers by storing energy needed to reduce peak loads — in a clean, environmentally friendly manner.
“Two of the highest-cost elements in our energy ledger are capacity and transmission costs,” said Jonathon Zwirko, HG&E’s project engineer and Energy Resources coordinator. “By timing things properly and discharging the batteries at the right time, we’re able to save on both capacity and trans- mission costs.”
Through the use of this battery system, which can store 6 megawatt hours of energy at a rate of up to 3 megawatts per hour, the utility can save 2% to 2.5% on its total energy costs annually, a number that will go higher when a second, larger battery facility, this one on Water Street, goes online later this month.
The solar facility and energy-storage facility are just a few components of a diverse clean-power portfolio that, as noted, also includes hydro, wind, and nuclear, a portfolio that gives the utility flexibil- ity and the ability to offer competitive rates, Lavelle said.
As noted, this powerful combination has helped bring some businesses to Holyoke that might not otherwise have considered that zip code.
That’s especially true of the cannabis businesses,
The hydroelectric faciliity at the Hadley Falls Dam is just one of HG&E’s many assets when it comes to green energy.
“We’re going to have to do those things so we don’t see a tripling of load.
Can we mitigate, or offset, that growth through energy efficiency and energy conservation and educate people on how to use less energy? We’ll have to. We’ll need to educate people about how to charge their electric vehicles at the right time — at night, right now — at off-peak times.”
request — each — which we’re prepared to handle.” Lavelle agreed.
“Part of our strategy with our local grid has been
anticipating this growth,” he told BusinessWest, adding that, starting with the computing center, which consumes roughly 4 megawatts, the city has
going to see a tripling of our load, every other utility is going to see a tripling of load, so there will be a huge demand.”
In the face of these seemingly inevitable surges in demand, utilities, including HG&E, will have to put an even greater emphasis on energy efficiency, conservation, and education to stem the tide, he went on.
“We’re going to have to do those things so we don’t see a tripling of load,” he said. “Can we miti- gate, or offset, that growth through energy efficien- cy and energy conservation and educate people on how to use less energy? We’ll have to. We’ll need to educate people about how to charge their electric vehicles at the right time — at night, right now — at off-peak times.”
Elaborating, he said there will likely be more
of what he called “behavioral incentives” that are already being used to change attitudes about clean energy and reduce surges in demand.
Summing up HG&E’s efforts toward transform- ing its energy system, Lavelle channeled Kermit the Frog by implying strongly that it’s not easy being green. In fact, it’s quite challenging.
But it’s necessary, and for many reasons. The state is demanding it, and, increasingly, customers, both residential and commercial, are demanding it as well.
Well before these demands became loud in nature, HG&E was committed to exploring and implementing strategies to make its power port- folio cleaner and more earth-friendly, knowing they would pay off, not with awards and accolades (although those have come, too) but in cost reduc- tions and opportunities for the city to grow and attract new businesses.
These investments are certainly starting to pay off, and as they do so, HG&E is making a powerful statement, literally and figuratively. u
George O’Brien can be reached at [email protected]
including large manufacturers, that have, well, put down roots in the city. They’ve been drawn by the hundreds of thousands of square feet of available mill space, said Zwirko, but even more important to them is the large amounts of green, compara- tively cheap electricity needed for all elements of the operations, but especially the lights that enable plants to grow.
Green Thumb Industries is currently operating
a plant on Appleton Street that consumes roughly 1.5 megawatts of electricity, said Zwirko, noting that Trulieve, which recently moved into the old Conklin Furniture complex just a few hundred yards from the Hadley Falls Dam, will, when operating at peak capacity, consume 4 megawatts. By contrast, Holy- oke Medical Center and Holyoke Community Col- lege each consume roughly a half-megawatt.
So these are huge users of electricity, he went on, adding quickly that HG&E can handle several more of these facilities.
“There are about 10 others that have received licenses and are in the process of construction,” he said, “and we probably have another handful that are knocking on our door, with that 5-megawatt
anticipated that it’s blend of clean, inexpensive power would attract more large-scale users. “We weren’t anticipating the cannabis industry at that time, but were targeting and anticipating data- related loads.
“We’d like to see more people, more jobs, tied to these developments, and while we haven’t seen that on the data side, we’re seeing it on the cannabis side,” he went on, adding that, with improvements made to the system, the city and its utility can accommodate another 15 or 20 megawatts worth of cannabis-related businesses.
Watt’s Happening?
While the utility is well-positioned to handle the needs of the present — and the addition of several more cannabis-related businesses — the future,
as noted, is dotted with question marks, especially when it comes to what’s becoming known as ‘elec- trification’ — of cars and many other things
“If we see a tripling of our load, and that power has to come from carbon-free sources, that will be a real challenge,” Lavelle said. “Different camps think offshore wind will fill in a lot of the gaps, but if we’re
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