This week, CEC released "Pointless Plastic," a short video highlighting the need to reduce dependence upon bottled water.

© Erin Feinblatt

The Project

As a part of an overall vision to lead the community away from energy-intensive products, CEC launched its "Rethink the Drink" campaign in January, aiming to reduce single use plastic bottles by 75% in several pilot schools. With funding from local partners, we installed 6 refill stations:

• Franklin Elementary
• Montecito Union Elementary
• Santa Barbara High (2 units)
• Santa Barbara Junior High
• Westmont College gym

The refill stations dispense cold, filtered water with both a regular water fountain spout and a quick-fill mechanism, and electronically display the number of times they've been used. Since the beginning of the year, students have used the stations 46,827 times as of June 6 – dramatically reducing their use of disposable plastic water bottles.

To encourage the students to use the refill stations, CEC and its project funders distributed reusable stainless steel canteens to all 600 students and staff at Franklin Elementary and displayed a Rethink the Drink poster adjacent to each refill station. At Santa Barbara High, 200 canteens were distributed with the help of the Dons Net Café student entrepreneur class, and Santa Barbara Junior High raffled over 50 canteens to students. Using its own funding, the Montecito Union School PTA's Green Team distributes canteens at the beginning of the year to every student and staff member.

Before and After

Prior to the project, a waste audit of Franklin Elementary showed that student, faculty and staff were using 275 bottles of water per week. Since installing a refill station, they use fewer than 50 a week.

Over the course of a school year, that's the equivalent of going from more than 11,000 bottles to less than 2,000.

"It is such a wonderful thing to teach students about saving the environment by playing an active role. Students as young as four have learned about how they are saving the earth by using canteens and the refill station. Our kids are healthier and have decided they'd rather drink water than bring anything from home because the canteens are cool and the water tastes good!"

-- Franklin Principal Casie Killgore

CEC's Vision

The production and transportation of bottled water is very energy intensive. More than 17 million barrels of oil each year are used to bring bottled water to our stores -- enough to fuel one million vehicles for a year! Despite being recyclable, fewer than 30% of the bottles make it to a recycling bin. CEC's vision is of a fossil free future where we choose energy-smart products that reduce our carbon footprint The reduction of single use plastic water bottles falls in line with that vision and the Rethink the Drink program is helping us get there .

Rethink the Drink's funding partners are the Orfalea Foundations, the Ann Jackson Family Foundation, MedBridge Development, and the Montecito Union School Green Team.

This month marks our one year solar power anniversary. Am I still a happy solar camper? You betcha!

Based on my calculations from the last year, we generated 555 kWh more than what we used. That's right -- we generated an extra half a megawatt hour. In the previous year we consumed 8,561 kWh. The year before that, 9,260 and before that, 9,779 (so year over year our consumption was decreasing as we became more energy conscious). For more information on kWh check out: http://www.carbonlighthouse.com/2010/08/kwh-vs-kw/

Enough KWH... How much money did I save?

We saved $1,357 dollars in the last year on electricity. Yes, we "paid" less than 20 bucks for electricity for the entire year. ("Paid" because our last bill ended up becoming a credit so we've been working off that credit.) We're now down to -$117, i.e. at 2 bucks or less we might not be paying a bill for a long while.

And guess what? The California Assembly passed a bill which was signed in 2009 (AB920) where we're going to be paid BACK by the Electric company for that extra 555 kWh we generated. Yep, we're going to bill the electric company! We just got a letter this week saying they are trying to figure this out... so we're not running off to Vegas with our extra cash just yet.

Upfront and Ongoing Costs

Upfront cost was $29K. After a $6.5k rebate from SoCal Edison we paid $23K out of pocket. This year we filed for our energy tax credit, which went smooth as silk. A 30% credit on the cost of the panels and installation (after the rebate from SCE).

$29,000 (Upfront Cost) - $6,500 (SCE Rebate) - $7,000 (energy tax credit) = $16,100 end cost

And an important point is we own these panels. They are ours forever. If we move, we can take them with us. Also, since we own them, they are officially an asset and increase the value of the house a good deal (either when sold or if we ever rent it out).

The only future project cost is that the inverter (which converts the DC from the panels into AC for the house) will need to be replaced in 10 years or so. Currently those run a couple grand. Who knows how much they'll cost in 10 years - hopefully less given that there should be a high volume.

Lessons Learned

In the end, it looks like we may have over-provisioned (i.e. got too many panels). Our installer offered a number of options (14, 16, 18 panels, etc.) and great guidance, but in the end it was up to me and I erred on the side of over vs. under and picked 18.

The goal is not to generate more. Or even 100%. The goal is to generate 80-90%. To generate enough to keep you in Tier 1, or worse case, Tier 2. Look at my bills below. You can see that I actually was charged less during months when we didn't over generate (by a dollar... but still). And fewer panels means much faster ROI.

Other tidbits

• We got a recall notice from SunPower (the Solar Panel manufacture/provider) for an inverter. That freaked me out and so I contacted our installer and they were Johnny-on the-spot. They replied right back that it wasn't actually my inverter, that SunPower sent a blanket letter to everyone of their customers, no matter what inverter they had. And they gave me the tips to prove that to my own satisfaction.
• We continued to have a great relationship with our installer, Sun Pacific Solar Electric, Inc. These guys kept in touch, checking in every so often and responding very quickly to any questions I had. And their work has so far stood the test of time.
• Keeping the panels clean is a little bit of a chore. Given our semi-arid environment, with constant winds, the panels get dusty during the summer/fall. All it takes is a quick spray every couple weeks to clean them, but still a little bit of pain. (Lucky they are uber-easy for us to get at)'
• After a session of some heavy rain and serious winds, there's no leaks, drips or roof issues. Yeah! :)

Now some eye candy.

This is from the solar panel company for the past year. Kind of neat that you can watch how much you generate over the day/week/year. If you're a new solar panel owner, you hit this site about every 10 minutes or so! But once the blush wears off, we've been checking it out every couple weeks. And what's nice is that if "something happens" like a sudden drop off in generation, they will send an email to our installers to let them know something is up. Like a tree grows and begins to shadow the panels, etc.

Here's our electric bill from the year before our panels (2009-2010); And this past year (2010-2011);

(See where the months we didn't over generate we were actually charged less? I had to laugh at that...)

So in the end would I do it again? In a minute. Even with all the credits, savings, rebates, etc, payback is still 7-10 years, so they are not a short term investment. If you plan to keep the property, they will pay off nicely in the long term. Think about how great they would be when on a fixed income/retirement!

We've been nothing but happy and the future is looking even brighter...

Read more about the Duncan Family's solar installation on Greg's blog:

• Solar Panel Installation - We're cooking with Solar!
• Solar Panel Installation Update - The Two-Dollar Electric Bill
• Solar Panel Update - Solar Power in the Southern California Winter - the $1 electric bill
• Our year in the sun... with solar power... (Original version of this post)

For more information on how you can go solar this summer, read more about Solarize Santa Barbara.

Almost every product and service we rely on today is manufactured with or transported by some amount of fossil fuels. Of course, the most important thing we can do to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels is to use less. However, when you do make a purchase, we encourage you to shop for energy-smart products that use less energy to produce.

Here at CEC, we're all about energy-smart products that help us move towards a fossil-free lifestyle and a fossil-free future for Santa Barbara. This is the first in a series of blog posts from CEC staff and supporters about their favorite eco-smart products and we hope you'll find an idea to inspire you.

Today, we're hearing from Sigrid Wright, CEC's Assistant Director.

There are very few "things" in the world that I would say I love, but this Lifefactory bottle is one of them. In the process of trying to solve one problem that had been bugging me for a while, this product helped me resolve a whole other issue.

My original problem was that I wanted to get away from plastic water bottles as much as possible. There's just so much wrong with them (e.g. that we use 17 million barrels of oil a year in the U.S. just to transport water bottles from one place to the next).

However, I don't like the taste of drinking out of stainless steel containers, or even reusable BP-free plastic bottles -- so I would fill various glass bottles that had originally contained tea or Pelligrino. These worked all right, but they were hard to clean and the caps weren't very durable so half the time I wasn't motivated to carry them around. As a result I often ended up not having water when I needed it.

When a friend brought one of these Lifefactory bottles to a meeting, I immediately bought one. It has a wide mouth so it's easy to clean and add ice, and a durable screw cap with a handle. It also has a silicone protective sleeve, so I'm not afraid it will break tumbling around in my bag. (Although I did drop one full force on pavement and had to replace it.)

But the reason I love it (and why I want to put three little hearts after this post) is that I drink much more water than I did before. It's always with me, and I now drink about three full 22 oz. bottles a day. The Lifefactory bottle has now become one of my favorite presents to give friends.

You can get a Lifefactory water bottle of your own or a different type of reusable water bottle at CEC's Amazon Store in the Reusable Water Bottle section. If you find something you like, a percentage of your purchase comes back to CEC.

Stay tuned to hear from our next CEC staffer, Michelle Kitson, about her favorite reusable bag.

Last week the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors took one step closer to generating a significant amount of the county government's electricity with solar power.  There are two solar projects currently underway:

• One at the Laguna County Sanitation District sewer treatment plant that will be one of the largest solar energy projects in Santa Barbara County to date.
• One adjacent to the county jail on Calle Real

Both projects come in at 1MW each; creating enough electricity to power about 400 homes.

Last week, both projects sailed though the County Planning Commission, but the project at the jail still needs Board approval for funding.  The Laguna Sanitation District project is already funded through a Qualified Clean Energy Bond (QCEB). The Calle Real project is hoping for the same type of bond funding.  On Tuesday the Board approved an application for a QCEB, but they must receive the bond and then the Board must approve the final contract.

While there is still some uncertainty, we are hopeful that both projects will move forward. 

If constructed, these projects would increase the amount of solar in Santa Barbara by approximately 30%. 

To keep updated on both projects, subscribe to CEC’s enews.

Not many new homes are being constructed anywhere these days, but Santa Barbara has a new development coming soon. City Ventures is bringing 48 LEED Platinum townhomes to East Beach. This residential project exemplifies Fossil Free by ’33. 

• The homes are super energy efficient - outfitted with energy efficient appliances and are all electric, natural gas free.
• They are constructed with many recycled and sustainable materials.
• Each townhome includes solar power. 
• To top it off, each unit will also be pre-wired for electric vehicle charging.

The units qualify as workforce housing, starting in the $400,000s for a two bedroom downtown Santa Barbara condo.  The hope is that some teachers, firemen, nurses, and other Santa Barbara workers will choose to buy here in the communities they work in, rather than commute from lower priced housing in Ventura or Santa Maria.  The condos are close to workplaces and recreation, downtown shopping and entertainment, and in a great location for walking, biking, and taking transit.

We hope City Ventures and their East Beach Collection is a hit in this community and proves that downtown Santa Barbara wants green, workforce housing, not expensive second home luxury condos.

"I learned a lot at Earth Day – everything from discovering the Solarize SB program, to meeting local solar installers, to information on incentives.

Personally, I'm pretty stoked to move forward with a solar installation now that my projected break-even point is 6-7 years. That’s not a bad financial return while doing the right thing for Mother Earth.”

-- Paul D., Santa Barbara resident

30 days after Earth Day, Paul D. met with a Solarize SB contractor at his home to assess it for a solar panel installation. This is what we love to see - a local resident getting inspired at Earth Day and then taking steps to make sustainable changes.

"I happily participated in the Green Car Show Ride and Drive this past April and was able to drive a Nissan Leaf.  I am a Prius driver, thus knew what to look for when trying out an all-electric car.  Nissan did an excellent job making the Leaf a very 'consumer-friendly' automobile.  The Leaf was comfortable, spacious and even fun to drive.  Most importantly, I didn’t feel as though I was driving a 'golf cart'.

The CEC did a great job to provide our community with the opportunity to view and even drive a multitude of alternative vehicles in their Green Car Show. I look forward to following CEC's Plug In Santa Barbara efforts."

-- Jeff C., Santa Barbara

Jeff plans to lease an electric vehicle.

Statement from Where's Your Bag

Where’s Your Bag partners Choose to Reuse and Santa Barbara Channelkeeper have been very involved in the parallel effort to advocate for bag reduction legislation.  While the Where’s Your Bag voluntary effort has been somewhat successful, these groups believe that legislation is really what is needed to see meaningful reduction.  Several California cities and counties have passed bag reduction legislation (Santa Monica, Calabassas, San Jose, Marin County, LA County and many more).  A statewide bag ban (AB 1998) nearly passed in September 2010. Where’s Your Bag believes that this momentum will encourage the state to take action and believes that Santa Barbara should be part of this movement.

Our Letter

In the April 21st issue of the Independent, Dean Tambling reported that Councilman Hotchkiss “questioned  the very validity of plastic bags as an environmental concern, arguing that they disintegrate and, being indigestible, pose no threat to coastal wildlife.” [“Council Duo Suffocates Plastic Ban”]

The immediate impact -- of wildlife getting entangled in plastic bags, clogging sewer pipes, blowing around and contaminating seas, lakes and rivers, – are documented and obvious with a walk on a beach or observation of street litter. More importantly, as the plastic bags photo-degrade (rather than “disintegrate”) into smaller toxic petrol-polymers, they eventually contaminate soil and waterways and as a consequence particles are  “digestible” and able to enter the food chain. To the extent that Councilman Hotchkiss was accurately reported, his statement was not factual, lacks “validity” and reflects only an opinion. 

– Jules Zimmer and Paul Orfalea

Published as a Letter to the Editor in April 28th issue of The Independent

Take Action

The full council will vote on the matter in the near future. We need your support. Contact your council members to let them know where you stand on this issue:

Mayor Helene Schneider: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Dale Fransisco: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Frank Hotchkiss: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Grant House: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Randy Rowse: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Michael Self: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
Bendy White: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it

Bring your bags! We are featuring our favorite reusable bags in CEC's Amazon store. We've got everything from standard reusable grocery bags, to sandwich and produce bags, to compact Chico bags. If you see something you like and you buy it through CEC’s Amazon site, a percentage of your purchase will come back to CEC – an earth friendly purchase, indeed. If you already use reusable bags at the grocery store, remember to carry one with you for smaller trips to the drug store, clothes shopping, and more.

We’re half way through May, which means we’re half way through National Bike Month! It also means we’re well into CycleMAYnia – a month-long celebration of bicycling events in our community. Check out the CycleMAYnia event page for the events going on through the end of the month.

CEC is celebrating by participating in Traffic Solutions’ Bike Challenge -- a friendly competition with five-member teams making round-trips by bike instead of by car. Team members log the days they bike on their online Commute Calendar. Each team must have two “converts” to qualify for prizes (a convert is someone who doesn’t normally bike for transportation). Each team gets a chance to win prizes and the highly sought-after title of Bike Challenge Champs.

This sort of thing is right up CEC’s alley. We gathered 5 CEC staffers to form an unstoppable team – the Clean Energy Crusaders. We’ve got:

• Megan “cute cruiser” Birney [Advocate]
• Michael “I do this for a living” Chiacos [Advocate]
• Eileen “lifelong biker” Daley [Advocate]
• Christa “mighty Mom” Backson [Convert]
• Michelle “I’m new here” Kitson [Convert]

Together, we’re a force to be reckoned with. At the close of week 1, we logged over 100 miles of bike commutes!

If you’re bike commuting to celebrate Bike Month too, check out CEC’s Amazon Store. We’ve packed it full of the type of bike accessories that we love. Plus, if you see something you like and you buy it through CEC’s Amazon site, a percentage of your purchase will come back to CEC – quite an earth friendly purchase.

We’ll see you out in the bike lanes!

Solarize Santa Barbara makes it easier and cheaper to go solar. CEC’s Solarize Santa Barbara is a new group-purchasing discount program for homeowners who want to go solar – kind of like a “Groupon” for solar panels. CEC does all the up-front work and makes it easy for you to go solar. When you participate in Solarize Santa Barbara, CEC will connect you with a pre-approved solar contractor who will give you a great value for a great solar power system.

Get started by attending an introductory workshop.

We’ll explain the benefits of buying in bulk with your neighbors, describe how to participate, and provide an introduction to the Solarize Santa Barbara program. Workshops will cover the basics of energy efficiency and solar, with plenty of time for you to ask questions.

Highlights include:

• Introduction to Energy Efficiency
• Basics of Solar Energy
• Financing Solar

RSVP on Facebook for the Santa Barbara Workshop and follow our Facebook Page for program updates.

Great news for electric vehicle (EV) owners and prospective owners on the South Coast - Coulomb Technologies, a leading provider of electric vehicle charging stations, is providing 25 (or more) charging stations to Santa Barbara County.  As the first universal charging stations in our region, they will make it easier to drive an EV. Since Santa Barbara is a large early-adopter market, many of our residents are already driving the Nissan LEAF, Chevy Volt, or will soon be driving some of the 12 EVs due on the market next year.

The new stations will be open to the public and strategically placed throughout the region, clustered in the areas of highest potential use, like downtown public parking lots. They are offered as Coulomb expands its ChargePoint America program, a public-private $37 million partnership to install 4,600 charging stations in key cities across America by the end of 2011.

Electric vehicles are a major component of CEC’s Fossil Free by ‘33 vision because they get around 100mpg equivalent and run on electricity instead of oil.

California is an exceptional place to leverage the benefits of EVs because our SoCal Edison grid already contains almost 20% renewable energy.

This will increase to 33% by 2020, so EVs actually get cleaner as they age. Due to California's cleaner grid, an EV here emits around 75% fewer greenhouse gas emissions than a comparable gasoline car. An added bonus - residents with solar panels on their roof can take it a step further by charging their electric vehicle at home. This means they're driving on sunshine!

Want to know more?

CEC leads Plug in Santa Barbara, a group of cities, businesses, utilities and others working to build charging stations and make it easier to use EVs.  In fact, this group was essential in attracting these charging stations to Santa Barbara. Learn more at www.PluginSB.org and "like" us on Facebook to get the latest news.

If you are one of the 38,000 people who attended Earth Day 2011 or one of the hundreds of exhibitors/sponsors, we want to hear from you! What were the highlights? Do you have any suggestions for next year?

The results for this survey get entered into our report and are used in the planning of Earth Day 2012. Once you've finished the survey, forward it along to your friends too! Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

During Earth Day this year we launched a text donation campaign to raise money for the Earth Day Festival. Each person who texted a donation was entered into a drawing for a stylin' beach cruiser. In fact, if you were one of the 38,000 people who had a blast at the festival this year you can still text a donation to support it for next year - text "Earth" to 50555 to make a $10 donation.

Now that the Earth Day dust has settled, we randomly drew our lucky winner. Congratulations to Kelly Cote from Montecito! Not only did he support CEC with a text donation but Kelly was also one of our hard-working volunteers at Earth Day this year.

Plus, he is a student at Santa Barbara High School and loves to refill his reusable water bottle at the refilling stations there. Those refilling stations are part of a CEC project called "Rethink the Drink" which aims to reduce consumption of plastic water bottles by 75% during this school year.

Kelly is certainly doing his part - keep it up and enjoy your new cruiser!

Many thanks go out to Isla Vista Bike Boutique who generously donated a bike from their shop.

And most of all, many many thanks go out to all of you who texted a donation this year. The Earth Day Festival would certainly not be possible year after year without your support - Powered by the People!

On May 1, CEC is launching Solarize Santa Barbara – a group purchasing program that makes buying home solar power as easy and affordable as possible. This pilot program is modeled after similar successful programs in cities like Portland, Oregon (which has 60 days of sunshine annually compared to our 300). Solarize Santa Barbara will reduce challenges that keep homeowners from going solar – like finding a contractor, pricing the right system, and permitting.
It works like this: as a Santa Barbara home or property owner, you sign up to be in the group. CEC does all the hard work: vetting and selecting a qualified solar contractor who will offer a group discount on a pre-selected solar energy system, and throw in technical help to get your new solar panels permitted. In no time, you’re generating your own electricity from sunshine.

Time is limited for this pilot program. Sign up today at our Solarize Santa Barbara page, and keep up with us on Facebook. Download CEC’s guides to Going Solar and Solar Financing for helpful information about home solar.

Last week the County of San Luis Obispo took a huge step toward energy independence by approving a 250 megawatt solar pv farm, also known as the California Valley Solar Ranch.  We’re excited about this news. Here’s why:

When it’s up and running, this solar farm will produce enough energy to power over 55,000 homes.

While that’s impressive, it is not the only reason that we like this project.  At CEC we are careful about the projects we endorse. We thoroughly review the full environmental impact report and ensure that the project mitigates the impacts to the greatest extent possible. Here’s a little insight into our process.

First, we check out where they are planning to build the project. The location of the project is the most important way to minimize impacts. We support projects that are:

1. On previously disturbed land – Most of this particular site is grazing land.  Parts are zoned for agriculture and parts were for a development project that never went forward.
2. Near existing transmission lines – The transmission line for this project is 3.6 miles from a substation. This is very close! Check out the map below.
3. Near existing load centers – This project is near load centers in both San Luis Obispo and King Counties.

Next, we investigate how they are minimizing their impact on the environment. In this project, SunPower plans to (among other things):

1. Avoid the most critical of habitat for species of special concern, namely the giant kangaroo rat.
2. Acquire conservation lands at a 4:1 ratio. This means that for every acre they disturb, they will put four acres into permanent conservation easements.
3. Participate in Regional Recovery Plans for species on the Carrizo Plain.

This SunPower project meets all of our requirements. We are proud to support this transition to safer, cleaner sources of electricity.