Marin Local Energy Council (MLEC)

Sustainable Fairfax is helping to conduct presentations throughout the county on forming a Joint Powers Authority. These presentations will give an overview of the MLEC and feature a video recorded at the March Marin County Council of Mayors and Councilmembers (MCCMC) meeting. Speakers include Paul Fenn of Local Power and Abby Young of the Cities for Climate Protection Campaign.

The combined purchasing power of all Marin residents, businesses and public agencies will be comparable to a medium-sized city, enabling each participating jurisdiction to:

• Provide Marin residents and businesses with energy security and stable energy prices
• Protect the health of children
• Promote sustainable economic development & high technology sector job creation in Marin
• Answer the call for local governments to take leadership in the effort to stop Climate Change

Background

Sustainable Fairfax has been working on global warming and energy issues for 3 years now with Council members Frank Egger, Lew Tremaine and Supervisor Hal Brown. On Tuesday, April 16th, 2002 the culmination of many years of collaboration led to a victory. A resolution introduced by Fairfax Mayor Lew Tremaine asking for the creation of a joint powers authority to be known as the Marin Local Energy Council passed unanimously. If this resolution is embraced county-wide, the MLEC can develop and fund renewable and conservation projects on a countywide scale. The central goal of the MLEC is to reduce Marin's net greenhouse gas emissions- 20% by the year 2020.

This goal is known as the "Toronto Target" in reference to the standard set by the city of Toronto in 1988 with a commitment to cut its greenhouse gas pollution by 20% over a seventeen-year period. The Toronto Target is so far the best existing standard for a local government.

The MLEC will provide both the will and the way to match this commitment, by 2020. Sustainable Fairfax is partnering with the statewide group CalPIRG and other local organizations in a coalition to see this resolution embraced countywide but we need your involvement. Support the Marin Local Energy Council in your city, town and the county by calling your elected offficals. For more information please call the MLEC information hotline at 258-9198.

More on the MLEC:

• Review the Fairfax Town Resolution (see below.)
• Why do we need the MLEC? (see below.)
  
• Marin IJ: Mar 29 - Local leaders push energy authority
• Marin IJ: April 10 - (editorial in Opinion) Energy idea needs cautious approach
• Ross Valley Reporter: Mar. 26- April 1 - Saving the world by saving Fairfax
• Ross Valley Reporter: April 2-April 8th - County Council members warned about warming and energy costs

Marin Local Energy Council Legislation

Resolution To Form and Join a Joint Powers Authority (J.P.A.)
Called “The Marin Local Energy Council”

I [Lew Tremaine] am joined by town councilman Frank Egger in calling on the Fairfax town council to approve the following resolution for the Town of Fairfax to form and join the Marin Local Energy Council:

"The Fairfax Town Council hereby resolves to directly create a Joint Powers Authority in conjunction with the Marin County Board of Supervisors and/or any city or town in Marin County, pursuant to California law, to be called the Marin Local Energy Council (‘Energy Council’), whose chartered purpose shall be to use its authorities as herein stated to achieve a twenty percent (20%) net, across-the-board reduction of all greenhouse gases created within participating jurisdictions from 1990 levels, by 2020. This schedule will match the commitment made by the city of Toronto, Canada in 1988.

In addition to Fairfax and the Marin County Board of Supervisors, each municipal government in Marin County shall be eligible to become a member of the Energy Council by voluntarily adopting an enabling ordinance or resolution, either by its local governing board or by a voter initiative. Fairfax shall become a founding member upon formation of the Energy Council. The Council’s chartered authorities shall include but not be limited to: first, the aggregation of public- and private sector Pacific Gas and Electric customers located in participating municipalities’ jurisdictions; second, the administration of public- and private sector energy efficiency and conservation programs; and third, the issuance of revenue bonds to finance the acquisition, design, construction, operation, maintenance, and provision of energy and energy-related infrastructure.

Each member government of the Energy Council shall have one vote, and shall be represented by its mayor or a council-designated town- or city council member. The mayor or designated council member shall duly attend meetings of the Energy Council on a quarterly basis, and also as determined on an as-needed basis by majority vote of the Energy Council."

Why a Local Energy Council?

The Energy Crisis Is Not Over. For businesses and residents of Marin’s cities and towns, blackouts are not the only thing to worry about. Pacific Gas & Electric’s rate increases have raised energy prices for some customers by more than 40% since last year, threatening the tight budgets of many small, medium and large businesses in the middle of a major recession. With rate caps coming off, prices could rise again at any time with little warning, causing mass bankruptcies as occurred in San Diego when San Diego Gas and Electric’s rate caps were removed in 2000.

The Energy Crisis Is Not Just About Money. Electricity production accounts for two-thirds of all childhood asthma, an epidemic in the United States. America is the world’s largest greenhouse gas polluter (California alone is the tenth largest), of which U.S. power plants comprise the largest single cause. Greenhouse gases are the leading cause of global climate change. International agreements such as the 1992 Rio Summit declaration urged the world’s local governments to assume leadership in stopping climate change.

Cities & Towns Are Moving to Protect Their Communities From the Next Crisis. With PG&E in bankruptcy court proposing to eliminate state price regulation of its power plants, and with the price of California’s predominantly natural gas-fired electricity firmly tied to increasingly volatile petroleum prices, many California local officials are looking to use aggregation and revenue bonds to provide their residents, businesses and public agencies energy security and price stabilization:

• The City of San Francisco has recently proposed becoming a “Community Choice” aggregator, negotiating cleaner power supply agreements at better, fixed prices on behalf of its residents and businesses in much the same way that most municipalities already do for garbage and cable television service. In Ohio, a recent “Community Choice” aggregation of 100 small towns switched 600,000 customers from coal & nuclear power to clean and renewable sources at a guaranteed lower price. Even PG&E called the San Francisco plan a “positive step.”
• Voters in San Francisco recently approved a “Community Power” revenue bond measure (Proposition H) to make renewable energy, efficiency and conservation installations available and affordable to their residents, businesses and public agencies, and is preparing to build a 50 Megawatt “Solar Power Facility” on homes, businesses & city properties, powering 50,000 apartments, or 10% of the base electricity demand of the entire community.
• Many California local governments are now applying for state funding to administer private and public sector Community Energy Efficiency programs.

Green Power Is Not Just For Environmentalists Any More. Today, renewable energy sources like wind power and conservation are already price-competitive with the cheapest fossil fuels. If purchased in volume, price barriers can also be removed for solar power and other energy technologies, making them affordable and price-competitive for residents and businesses alike. Most important, unlike coal and gas plants, renewable energy and conservation require no fuel to produce energy. Independent from increasingly volatile fossil fuel markets and invulnerable to terrorist attack and earthquake alike, green power is more secure than either fossil fuel or nuclear power plants.`