HomeMy WebLinkAboutDecember 8
Environmental Initiatives Committee
Minutes
DATE: Monday, December 8, 2008
TIME: 7:30pm
LOCATION: Parks & Recreation Building
26379 Fremont Road
Los Altos Hills
Roll Call: The following were present: Ian Earnest, John Harpootlian, Lew
Jameson, Breene Kerr, Raj Reddy, Steve Schmidt, Jay Shideler. Guest attendees:
Rich Larson & Margie Suozzo..
Committee acceptance of the minutes: All present accepted the November 24,
2008 Minutes as-is.
Energy:
1. Energy Renewable & Consumption Reduction Initiatives:
Steve presented a graph-spreadsheet presentation for reduction of GHG (by GHG
contributing category) for both LAH Government and separately, for the LAH
residential community. Seven GHG contributing categories were analyzed for
both the government and the residential community. A reasonable and logical
year-by-year reduction proposal was made for each category and plotted in an
excel spreadsheet for the years 2008 through 2015. Each category was analyzed
for year-by-year feasibility. The analysis indicated that by the year 2015, net
LAH GHG reduction goals of 50% for government and 30% for residential was a
feasible and viable goal. The EIC voted unanimously to accept these goals and to
recommend these goals to the Town Council:
• Present the LAH GHG analysis to the next Town Council – (H-H) Steve,
Peter.
• Continue to refine GHG analysis spreadsheet – (H-H) Steve, Peter.
2. PG&E and LAH audits: A detailed excel spreadsheet was presented by Steve for
entering and tabulating specific GHG related items when doing residential audits.
Spreadsheet is still a “work in progress” but will serve as a good starting point. A
mock home audit was performed on both Steve and Peter’s homes to test the audit
spreadsheet. Some talk pursued on making the audit spreadsheet web-based so
Any writings or documents provided to a majority of the Environmental Initiatives Committee regarding any item of the open
session portion of this agenda will be made available for public inspection in the City Clerk’s office located at 26379 Fremont
Road, Los Altos Hills, California
during normal business hours.
that data could be entered via a blackberry while doing the audits. Some residents
are calling in volunteering their home for “beta” home audits. Moreover,
progress has been made in the PG&E $20k grant, which unfortunately, would not
fund until the 3rd quarter of 2009. Breene stated that the Town Council would be
receptive for $20k to help fund the audits in addition to the PG&E funding:
• Home audit format and procedure – Continue to solidify, then commence with
trial audits of volunteer homes - (H-H) Steve, Peter.
• Acterra home audit training in Sunnyvale – Due to time constraints and to the
unique nature of LAH homes, the EIC recommends EIC members not
necessarily attend this training. Try to get the Acterra training handout for the
EIC – (M-H) – Lew.
• Lew brought a B&D power meter monitor which costs only $100. Contact
B&D to see if a volume purchase discount can be arranged for the home
audits (each monitor could be given to each home being monitored free of
charge) – (H-H) Lew.
3. Establish home audit game-plan (with milestones) for education and training –
(H-H) Lew.
• Resident’s annual participation spreadsheets – Evaluate efficacy of using such
a flier for residents to tract their own progress. Also, consider converting to a
web-base – (H-H) – Lew, Jitze.
• Petition the other three Town Council persons to volunteer their homes for the
GHG reduction audit – (H-H) – Breene Kerr.
4. Town Hall energy monitoring:
• FSI analysis recommendations from report:
a) Look into implementing a simple EMS (Energy Management System) that
would work for at least controlling the thermostats. - (H-H) Peter..
b) Data room outside cooling – implement ASAP – contact Carl Cahill with
recommendation – (H-H) Walt, Jay
5. Solar Energy Generation:
• Flier of P.V. Solar Systems Purchase Options has been submitted for the
perusal by the Town attorney. Flier needs to be put into a more condensed
format - (H-H) Jay.
• Check into requirements/restrictions for LAH government funding of solar
systems for residential homes – (M-M) Jay, Rich Larson.
Green Construction and Demolition (H-H) - Raj:
1. Build-it-Green requirement – procedure ready for next new home applicant
Recycling:
2. GreenWaste Recovery’s service – Continue to monitor GreenWaste. - (H-H) –
Jay.
3. GreenWaste recycling monthly spreadsheet: Progress has been made about
calculating GHG avoidance through recycling. Data has been obtained for all
other entries of the spreadsheet - (H-M) – Jay.
4. End destination of GreenWaste recycled material: The market for recycled
material has collapsed – continue to monitor GW to find out where recyclables
are going. - (M-H) Jay.
5. Write article for the next Town Newsletter about the changeover status of
GreenWaste – (M-M) Jay.
Water Consumption, S.O.D. and Fire Prevention:
1. Landscape Water & Conservation Guidelines – CA AB1881 irrigation guideline
for landscapes has been changed to include only landscapes larger than 5,000 sq.
feet and pertains only to new landscapes applied for permitting after January 1,
2010. Some members expressed concern about the complexity of the subsequent
landscape required auditing – a better way may be to accelerate the higher tier
water usage rates to discourage consumption and to establish education and
assistance to the high-user homeowners:
• The EIC encourages anyone to write to the state of California by December
31, 2008, expressing their opinion and recommendations concerning this
ordinance– (H-H) – (all).
• Cal water – what is the plan for implementing digital water meters? (H-H)
Lew.
• “Gray water” utilization in LAH – analysis ongoing. Make recommendation
to the EIC – (M-M) – Margie.
• Pools, pool pumps, fountains, waterfalls discussion – Put together a guideline
flier for design of pools, pool pumps, water falls and fountains, to be
submitted to residents/contractors at time of permitting. Flier is overdue – (H-
H) – Ian.
• Evaluate trucking in reclaimed water for the LLF in case of a severe drought
this summer – (M-M) Breene, Rich Larson.
Miscellaneous:
• Status of official web-site for EIC – (H-H) – Lew.
• Mark Jensen will no longer be an official member of the EIC but, instead,
revert to a guest member.
Next Meeting: Monday, January 19, 2009 at 7:30PM in the Parks and Recreation
Building.
Concept for establishing Goals and setting Priority: These minutes, henceforth, shall
follow the format of denoting priority as (Value-Time) until further notice. “Value” and
“Time” are expressed as one of three letters: “H” – high, “M”- medium or “L” – low.
JAS 11-24-08