What Has SJVCEO Been up to in July

We hope everyone is taking full advantage of their summer while surviving the heat waves that have been rolling through many areas. The team here at SJVCEO has been trying to stay cool while cranking up the heat on energy savings and encountering temperatures topping out at 109.

The VIEW Partnership is very happy to announce that, with the help of our energy champion partners, we have reached our annual goal of energy savings only halfway through the year.We would like to take a moment to applaud our partners on all of the hard work they have been doing, keep up the great work! Though we have met goal for 2016 we will continue to rack up the savings until December and push ourselves to be over achievers. While finishing out this year we are also beginning to focus on 2017 and potential savings that may be out there. Many of our partners have outlined work within their CIP (city/county improvement projects) listings that have been identified by SJVCEO staff as potential projects for next year as well as years to follow. We are very excited at the items that have been identified and will make sure to keep our readers updated.

The HDR Partnership has also hit its energy saving goal for 2016 as mentioned in a previous months update. The partners continue to share past and future projects with the group to help stir innovation as well as help other partners identify what savings potential may be out there. With the help of the partners and local chambers the partnership has worked to get the word out regarding the SCE Direct Install Program that will be wrapping up on August 12th. If you happen to be a business within the HDR area and have had wonderful success with the program please let us know. We always enjoy hearing positive stories regarding the program. We are also very excited to let everyone know that the partnership is very close to having a brand new logo. As soon as we have a final decision we will be sure to share that great news with our readers.

Our METU has undergone some changes in the staffing department over the last month. Our program lost one of its project analysts at the beginning of July. We wish him nothing but the best and are looking to fill the open position as soon as possible. If you happen to have someone in mind who has energy industry experience please pass along the opportunity when the position listing is available. We will be sure to share the position listing once the job description has been finalized. While we go through the staffing transition we are continuing to work with the City of Kingsburg on benchmarking and energy project opportunities. We hope to have an update and some numbers to share on next months write up.

SJVCEO is also excited to begin work on our California Energy Commission (CEC) awarded BioDico, a renewable energy technology provider, a grant to support a Zero Net Energy Farm in Five Points, CA. All of the farm’s energy needs will be supplied by distributed renewable energy including solar, wind, anaerobic digestion and gasification. Many biomass-to-energy plants located in the San Joaquin Valley have closed and this project will help offset some of the impacts of open burning of agricultural waste. The SJVCEO was selected to be a subcontractor on this project and the organization, along with BioDico and other subcontractors including CSU Fresno, Fresno COG, CALFIRE, and APCD, will create a model that may be replicated by other agricultural sectors and firms in the future.

Make sure to stay cool and safe for the remainder of the summer!