Washblog

The following is a partial list of organizations and governmental agencies that I know to be influential in the renewable energy sector in Washington State. I know there are organizations missing from this list.  Does anyone want to add on?

• Apollo Alliance. Washington Apollo is a coalition of unions, environmental groups and community-based organizations pursuing a statewide agenda of investment in renewable energy and energy efficiency to create good jobs, achieve energy independence, revitalize underserved and rural communities and improve our environment.
• Bonneville Environmental Foundation
  "A charitable and non-profit public benefit corporation dedicated to encouraging and funding activities and projects that lead to greater reliance on clean, environmentally preferred renewable power, and to healthy sustainable fish and wildlife habitat within the Pacific Northwest."
• Citizen's Utility Alliance of Washington. The Alliance mission is to educate, organize, and advocate for residential utility cusomers. Among their goals: promoting energy conservation and renewable energy source and promoting public polices that ensure affordable access to power for all of Washington’s residents, especially low-income and vulnerable citizens.
• Climate Friendly Farming.  This is a Washington State University program from the Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources helping farmers to develop and implement agricultural systems and practices that mitigate global climate change.
• Climate Solutions. Climate Solution's mission is to stop global warming at the earliest point possible by helping the Pacific Northwest and British Columbia become world leaders in practical and profitable solutions.
• Harvesting Clean Energy is a project of Climate Solutions.  Its goal is to build awareness of the benefits of renewable energy technologies for rural landowners and communities in Washington, Oregon, Idaho and Montana, and to support implementation through technical and educational resources.
• Institute for Washington's Future.  IWF advances economic development that helps depressed communities recover prosperity and self-determination. We harness public and private capital in the service of new enterprises designed to maximize local participation and produce real benefits: high-quality jobs, enriched tax bases, and the sustainable use of natural resources.  The Institute's main program areas are community development and alternative energy.
• Northwest Biodiesel Network.  This is a grassroots organization with a mission of promoting the use of biodiesel in the Northwest as an immediate and effective way to advance environmental health, economic strength, and social and political well-being.  It serves as a kind of clearinghouse of information for people who want to use biodiesel in their vehicles.
• Northwest Energy Coalition. This is an alliance of more than 100 environmental, civic, and human service organizations, progressive utilities, and businesses in Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana, Alaska and British Columbia promoting development of renewable energy and energy conservation, consumer protection, low-income energy assistance, and fish and wildlife restoration on the Columbia and Snake rivers.
• Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance.   The Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance is a non-profit corporation supported by electric utilities, public benefits administrators, state governments, public interest groups and energy efficiency industry representatives. These entities work together to make affordable, energy-efficient products and services available in the marketplace.
• Northwest Energy Efficiency Council.  This is a non-profit trade association of the energy efficiency industry.
• Northwest Solar Center. This is a project of Washington State University.  Its guiding board consists of northwestern utilities, not-for-profits, and governments promoting solar energy development.
• Northwest Sustainable Energy for Economic Development. This organization works in the NW to help build rural economies through clean, affordable and distributed energy and to advance energy independence for the Northwest by developing and supporting creative projects, policies, and financing models to meet the region's power needs through local, sustainable energy sources.
• Our Wind Coop
  This cooperative, initially supported by grans from the U.S. DOE, invests in small-scale wind turbines for farms, ranches and public and private facilities across the Northwest. 10-kW turbines are being installed at numerous rural sites serviced by publicly-owned utilities, creating low-risk opportunities to explore on-farm green power production, distribution, ownership and marketing models to meet local energy needs.
• Pacific Northwest Electric Power and Conservation Planning Council. This Council was created by Federal law (16 U.S.C. 839) in 1980. This law authorized the establishment and operation of the Council, and provided that two persons from the states of Idaho, Montana, Oregon, and Washington be appointed. Among other things, the Council is responsible for preparing a regional conservation and electric power plan as well as a fish and wildlife protection, mitigation, and enhancement program to deal with the operation of hydroelectric facilities on the Columbia River and its tributaries.
• Pacific Regional Biomass Energy Partnership
  The Pacific Regional Biomass Energy Partnership is a regional effort that encourages the development of bioenergy in Alaska, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington. It is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy and state energy offices.
• Renewable Northwest Project. This organization, founded in 1994, is a broad coalition of public-interest organizations and energy companies.  It promotes development of the region's untapped renewable resources by working with local organizations and energy companies to get workable renewable projects in the ground, promoting policies that support renewable energy development, encouraging utilities and customer groups to invest in new renewables, and helping to develop the markets for renewables.
• Solar Washington A private not-for-profit association of solar energy equipment manufacturers, system integrators, distributors, dealers, designers, consultants, students, and interested people with a mission to promote the development and effective use of solar and renewable energy and the related arts, sciences, and technologies with concern for the economic, environmental, and social fabric of Washington State through education.
• Sustainable Northwest.  Sustainable Northwest partners with communities and enterprises to achieve economic, ecological, and community vitality and resilience.
• Washington Public Utilities District Association . This organization "represents 28 not-for-profit, community-owned and operated utilities that bring electricity, water, wastewater service and wholesale telecommunications to more than 1.7 million people in Washington." It endorses Yes on I-937.

  Public utility districts (PUDs) are nonprofit, community-owned and governed utilities. Washington's first initiative to the legislature (1930), gave citizens of each county the right to form a PUD. The Washington State Grange sponsored the PUD initiative because private power companies at that time refused to bring electric service to farms and small communities. In WA, 831,660 customers are serviced by PUDs, 587,674 by municipal systems, 142,433 by cooperatives and mutals, and 1,280,974 by investor-owned (profit-making) systems.

• Washington State Department of Community, Trade, and Economic Development's Energy Policy Division is charged under state law with the task of facilitating the development and use of a diverse array of energy resources with emphasis on renewable energy. Every two years, the CTED is required under state law to deliver an energy report to the governor and legislature that focuses on implementation of the state energy strategy.
• Washington State University Extension Energy Program. This program provides energy services, products and information to industrial plants, private consulting firms, power marketers, utility consortiums, government agencies, and utilities, as well as the general public. The focus is on renewable energy and conservation. It has a
  budget of about $6 million and a staff of 60.
• WSU Climate Change and Rural Energy Development Center serves as a "central, non-regulatory clearinghouse of credible and reliable information addressing various aspects of climate change and clean energy activities."

Recent reports/Resources

• New Energy for the States: Apollo Alliance:
• Biomass Inventory and Bioenergy Assessment: An Evaluation of Organic Material Resources for Bioenergy Production in Washington State: Craig Frear, Bingcheng Zhao, Guobin Fu, Michael Richardson and Shulin Chen, December, 2005
• Generating Solutions: How Clean, Renewable Energy Is Boosting Local Economies And Saving Consumers Money: US Public Interest Research Group.
• Energy Atlas: NW Seed and the Land and Water Fund of the Rockies
• The New Harvest: Biofuels and Windpower for Rural Revitalization and National Energy Security. The Energy Foundation.
• Bioenergy Inventory and Assessment for Eastern Washington, Shulin Chen, Craig Frear, BingCheng Zhao, and Guobin Fu, Washington State University, the Department of Ecology, and INTEC. An assessment of Eastern Washington’s twenty counties for available biomass and calculating the potential energy production of the biomass via anaerobic digestion.
• The Fifth Northwest Electric Power and Conservation Plan. From the Pacific Northwest Electric Power Planning and Conservation Council.
• Washington State Energy Strategy . A legislatively mandated strategy. Department of Community, Trade, and Economic Development.
• Database of State Incentives for Renewable Energy.
  "Established in 1995, the Database of State Incentives for Renewable Energy (DSIRE) is an ongoing project of the Interstate Renewable Energy Council (IREC), funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and managed by the North Carolina Solar Center."

Businesses

• Imperium Renewables, Inc. was founded as Seattle Biodiesel, LLC in 2003. One of the largest Biodiesel refineries in the country, 100 million gallons per year, in Gray’s Harbor Washington, was scheduled to begin operation in the second quarter of 2007. Imperium is planning construction of refineries for production of another 300 million gallons per year of capacity by the end of 2008.
• Northwest Energy Technology Collaborative
  The Northwest Energy Technology Collaborative is a joint effort of business, government, non-profit and educational institutions determined to accelerate the emergence and growth of the energy technology industry in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With world-class university and research centers and more than 300 new energy companies, our region is poised to become a global hub for emerging power technology."