Dr. Richard Teschner Receives Star on the Mountain Award

Dr. Richard Teschner, recipient of the Star on the Mountain Award

At today's El Paso City Council meeting, the Mayor and Council presented the Star on the Mountain Award to Dr. Richard V. Teschner. The inscription reads:

Star on the Mountain Award

Presented to

Dr. Richard Teschner

The City of El Paso applauds your advocacy and

commitment to build the Franklin Mountains

State Park Headquarters and Visitor Center.

Your contributions and generosity continue to improve

the quality of life for the El Paso community.

Mayor Oscar Leeser - September 15, 2015

Charlie Wakeem and Richard Teschner at Resler Canyon

Dr. Teschner, Professor-Emeritus of Linguistics at the University of Texas at El Paso, has been a preeminent figure in the conservation community. Because of his generosity and the efforts of fellow preservationist, Charlie Wakeem, a beautiful arroyo known as Resler Canyon was preserved in 2005. He is a current member of the Open Space Advisory Board, President of the Friends of the Rio Bosque, a member and past chair of State Senator Rodriguez's Environmental Commitee and a Legacy member of the Nature Conservancy. Recipient of other environmental awards, he is also a Rim Road neighborhood leader and the newly elected President of the El Paso Neighborhood Coalition.

Dr. Teschner advocating for the preservation of Castner Range

Probably his biggest quest is still to be realized: the preservation of Castner Range for which Dr. Teschner has made multiple trips to Washington D.C., spent hours on a conservation committee, given public talks and pursued avidly for years.

To say that he is an extraordinary conservationist is quite the understatement. Congratulations, Dr. Teschner.

Solar Customers Subsidize El Paso Electric Company

Future of El Paso Electric

Taking a page from the Koch brothers and groups such as ALEC, El Paso Electric claims that solar users are "free loaders" or "free riders" subsidized by themselves while relying on non-solar users to expand and maintain the grid. 

The free loader is El Paso Electric Company.

Basic Points On How Solar Saves The Utility Money:

1. Solar users sell electricity back to the utility at 2.5 cents and El Paso Electric Company (EPEC) resells it to their neighbors for 10+ cents. 
2. Solar reduces transmission and distribution costs on the grid.
3. It reduces wear and tear on other equipment on the grid such as transformers, etc. 
4. It reduces man hours and other equipment costs to repair the grid.
5. Solar is produced and used onsite: no carbon, no water, no use of the grid when consuming 100% of solar. Therefore solar users are not adding wear and tear to the grid which saves the utility money. 
6. Solar uses no water. How much water does it take to frack a gas well? How much water is used at each gas plant across our city to produce electricity?  We are in the desert!  Water matters and solar saves water!
7. Environmental savings include clean air and clean, more abundant water. 
8. Solar creates JOBS. Solar is the 21st century solution to energy independence. Solar creates commerce, which puts more meters on EPEC’s grid which is a good thing for them too! Solar will create more jobs, more students, more meters, and more revenue for the city.  We could become a hub for new manufacturing jobs such as Solar Plants, Inverter Plants, Racking Plants, etc. 
9. Solar helps reduce peak loads especially with western-facing solar energy systems. El Pasoans should be asking for a large rebate for any western-facing rooftops which would reduce load significantly from 3 PM to 7 PM every day of the year.  There is already a case study on this in Austin, Texas at the old Mueller Airport. It's called the Pecan Street Project.  Look up the solar neighborhood, they received larger rebates for western roofs, offset over 1MW of residential solar during peak and saves the city millions over 25 years. If we all did this across the city, we could reduce load.  Utility batteries are also a huge solution to peak load that would reduce our overall utility costs as well as reduce the rates for everyone. 
10. Geothermal heat pumps on all AC units city wide could be a new rebate program!  This would encourage more job growth and reduce peak loads all summer long during the heaviest peak month. This would reduce the need for some of our current power plants and would reduce yearly peak. 
11. Home battery backup systems could also be setup to shave every home’s peak demand from 3 PM to 7 PM year round.  This could cut peak to 250,000 homes in El Paso alone.  Peak doesn’t seem so scary now and seems much easier to solve, but they want 50-year power plants with 10% guaranteed rates of return from rate payers.  El Pasoans must get them to shut down plants and not keep building!  We need solar and wind farms, geothermal rebates, energy efficiency rebates, etc. These will create jobs, grow the city, and grow the utility's revenue long term. 
12. Answers exist, but EPEC ignores them instead of innovating and expanding beyond antiquated business model ideas.

Why Is EPEC So Afraid of Solar?

Cartoon by Mike Luckovich, Atlanta Journal-Constitution

It seems that the El Paso Electric Company is afraid of the solar industry. They seem afraid of your having solar panels on your home and producing your own clean energy. If you buy electricity from them even if it is generated by photovoltaic panels, that's okay. Just don't produce your own, thank you very much. Why?

Of course it cuts into their profits. It's not just solar users, it's most of us. Over the last five or so years, demand for electricity has been down in El Paso. Solar is a very small part of reducing that demand. More efficient appliances and energy efficient homes have reduced demand. Yet, EPEC wants all of us - not just solar users - to pay higher fees to help them build more production facilities. Why? Again, demand is down. 

First, know that EPEC sells energy that it doesn't use back to the grid where other utilities can buy it. They make money on excess electricity. We are all subsidizing EPEC by financing their capital improvements. They improve, sell to the grid and get you to pay for all of it. Over five years they have made just about a half billion dollars in El Paso. How much has gone back to our community? A thousand buck pop for this thing or that thing. Good PR only.

Second, EPEC's rate hike on solar is really part of a nationwide cabal by the oil and gas industry and the electrical utilities to stop solar - to take away your right to buy a different product. They and their cronies talk free markets, but the unspoken disclaimer is that the market is free as long as it only belongs to them.

The Koch brothers and big utilities campaign to unplug solar power is the title of a David Horsey piece for the Los Angeles Times last year. About the tea party darlings, Horsey writes: "Consumer choice. Business competition. Autonomy for individual Americans. Those certainly seem like sound conservative principles. You would think that is something the Koch brothers could appreciate, but, obviously, their brand of conservatism is defined less by principles than by profits." Note to readers: the Kochs aren't really conservatives. They are oligarchs. As the article mentions, real conservatives like Barry Goldwater, Jr. (Yes, Barry's boy and a good man. I've met him.) Barry Jr. is for consumer choice.

Even the Walmart Waltons have joined the effort to stop you from having solar panels on your home. Certainly Walmart isn't a utility or a natural gas or coal producer. But they are 30% owners of First Solar, a company that makes solar arrays for utility companies. First Solar and the good ol' Waltons don't want you making your own energy. They want you to buy electricity from utilities. That is why the Walmart heirs "have given $4.5 million dollars to groups like the American Enterprise Institute, the American Legislative Exchange Council, and Americans for Prosperity—groups that are attacking renewable energy policies at the state level and, specifically, pushing for fees on rooftop solar installations." Read more HERE.

Remarkably the Walmart is the largest corporate user of solar panels. In Walmart Is the Biggest Corporate Solar User. Why Are Its Owners Funding Groups That Oppose Solar?, Tim McDonnell states:"Walmart loves solar power—as long as it's on their roof, and not yours." Tim's article also has a long list of the groups Walmart supports. All these groups in one way or another are fighting clean energy.

EPEC wants you to pay for their production so that they can sell the excess energy to other utilities. They don't want you to use solar and will dissuade you from doing so not because of what they are saying in their PR hype, but because they are part of a nationwide effort to destroy the solar industry so they and they alone sell you electricity. 

Say NO to unfair solar fees

There is a new "take action" page published by Public Citizen. It is a means of making the current change.org petition more focused specifically on El Paso Electric Company's unfair rate increases for solar panel users. 

What is especially great about the Public Citizen's form is that your message will go directly to the Mayor and each of the City Council representatives. When I created the change.org petition for Eco El Paso I mistakenly had the emails directed to the Municipal Clerk's office. Kaiba White of Public Citizen called that office and discovered that they do not forward messages to the Mayor or Council. I was wrong. Since her discovery, I have changed the recipient of the change.org petition to the Mayor. However, on change.org there can only be one email recipient. 

I apologize for having your petition going to an office that cannot deliver email to Mayor or Council. However, I have made an open records request for all those emails so that your voice can still be heard by members of City Council. I will see to that.

The change.org petition is a chance to say NO to all the proposed rate hikes. Public Citizen's "take action" item targets specifically the unfair rate hikes proposed for just solar panel users.

If you have signed the change.org petition, please also fill out the "take action" form. You can find a link to it at www.elpasonaturally.blogspot.org at the very top of the right hand blue column. If you haven't signed the petition or done the action form, please take a moment to complete both. The change.org petition is right below the "take action" button. 

Please share this blog post with everyone you know here in El Paso. Say NO to the onerous rate hikes and say NO to the unfair solar fees.

Say NO to Unfair Solar Fees

Say NO to El Paso Electric


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Water District At It Again

The El Paso Water Improvement District #1 (EPWID) is at it again. They are currently mowing the vegetation along the Franklin Canal by the El Paso Zoo. You will recall that they plowed through vegetation in the riparian zones of drains in El Paso's Upper Valley. This was during nesting season for birds and mammals. As a result the El Paso Water Utilities (EPWU) wrote a new policy to be more mindful of animal habitats. EPWU responded to the concerns of environmentalists. When asked about mitigating the loss of vegetation in the Upper Valley, Mr. Jesus (Chuy) Reyes only had this to say: “I am not interested in replanting native vegetation.” 

elpasonaturally has reached out to Mr. Reyes and is asking him about the benefit of mowing along the canals.

More later on this developing story.

Don't Believe El Paso Electric Company

Don't believe El Paso Electric Company when they tell you that they are a leader in solar energy or any form of renewable energy.

EPEC just filed its Integrated Resource Plan (IRP), a twenty-year operations plan) with the New Mexico Public Regulation Commission (NMPRC). An energy and environmental expert called it a "real Edsel". He wrote that there is "[n]o ramping up of conservation or peak demand control programs.  Only 7% renewables in future new plant development plans.  No strategies for dealing with innovations in battery storage, electric vehicles, or smart grid control technologies.  Two plants are scheduled to operate at 2% of capacity, six plants at 1% or lower capacity, while yet another sits in "reserve" completely unused."

That's there 20-year operations plan for New Mexico. 

In El Paso, as you already know, they want to create a new class of ratepayers: Partial Requirements Service, i.e. solar customers and raise their rates by 24%. It's bad enough that they want to sock it to the rest of us for a 12% increase. But 24%? Wow!

Is EPEC in El Paso doing much more on renewables? No.

Moreover, Texas law pays for Conservation and Demand reduction through an EECRF, Energy Efficiency Cost Recovery Factor. It allows an electrical utility to recover costs for providing programs for customers to become more energy efficient. They want to raise our rates but they do not want to provide funding to help you and me lower our bills.

All of this sounds like a company that wants to sell you electricity at a high rate but doesn't want to encourage energy efficiency or clean, renewable energy.

Does El Paso Electric CEO Shockley Sleep at Night?

That's the question when you hear his sophistry and misinformation that he feeds to the public about El Paso Electric Company's proposed rate hikes.

If you haven't, take a moment to read Vic Kolenc's El Paso Times Story, El Paso Electric wants to increase charges for solar homes. 

Included in that story are the onerous rate increases for every El Pasoan who doesn't have solar energy panels. That increase is 12%. Combine that fact with Lindsey Anderson's story this morning, School districts may fight El Paso Electric rate increase, because it will cost districts millions, anyone can see the huge burden these rate increases put on everyone as a rate payer and as a school district tax payer.

When it comes to solar energy users, the rate hike is 24% for what electric utilities like to call "free loading" by "free riders" (the rooftop solar owners) - getting the advantage of the utiliy's infrastructure without contributing equally to it. Nonsense! With more people converting to solar, there is less need for added infrastructure. But, less need for utility power production and distribution, means far less money that the utility makes. 

Shockley claims that EPEC has a proven record with solar. They were forced by New Mexico law six years ago to increase renewable energy production. In time EPEC discovered that solar had economic advantages so they have invested in solar energy plants. Great. What if they invested more through incentives in photovoltaic panels for homeowners and businesses and cut the need for bigger solar plants of their own? Shockley doesn't care about solar. Shockley cares about how much money his company is making. Therefore, when it comes right down to it, he doesn't want you to produce your own electricity from solar. He wants you to buy it from EPEC however they produce it - mainly with natural gas. (Frackers love him.)

The Shockley statement (reported by Kolenc) that I found most shocking was that "the rooftop solar industry has local and national lobbyists and lawyers who will aggressively make their case to regulators." By far the biggest lobbying effort against clean energy such as photovoltaics is coming from the infamous Koch Brothers and a lobbying group known as ALEC. No matter what ALEC claims about being for a free market and local control, they are anything but. They are for control of markets by mega-corporations and especially the gas and oil industry, and they want control of public laws to limit local control even to the point of those free-riding solar panel users. Just read through the following stories online:

The Koch Attack on Solar Energy

Koch Brothers And ALEC Expand Fight On Clean Energy Users

Exposing ALEC: How Conservative-Backed State Laws Are All Connected

Texas lobbying group busted for phony anti-solar campaign

In Sunshine State, Big Energy Blocks Solar Power

Utilities wage campaign against rooftop solar

All efforts by the solar industry's lobbying efforts are miniscule compared to the billions paid for lobbying by the Kochs, ALEC, the fossil-fuel industries and the electric utilities themselves. Schockley must know this.

In the end, El Paso Electric will burden not just solar users but all users - homeowners, business people, schools, etc. Rate payers and tax payers. You and me. There is an online petition opposing the rate hikes. Please visit it now.

Again, from an elpasonaturally reader:

I make tacos.
You buy my tacos for $5 each.
You no like my tacos?
Then you pay me $8.
Someone has to pay for my tacos.


Please support elpasonaturally©. Go HERE to contribute and help turn El Paso "green".