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A city lawman accuses UNM of being “anti-solar energy.”
Jason Marks, an Albuquerque attorney who has served with the state’s Public Regulation Commission, said the University is a member of the New Mexico Industrial Energy Consumers (NMIEC), a lobbying group in Santa Fe.
Marks said the group has been pushing in the state Legislature and at the PRC against legislation that would require solar energy sources to be part of the state’s total electricity consumption.
“The organization lobbies at the Legislature to keep electric rates as low as possible,” he said. “A large part of their advocacy has been in opposition of the state’s renewable energy requirement. NMIEC has, since 2007, been fighting to repeal the solar targets in the renewable energy rules.”
In March 2007, the state Legislature signed a law requiring the state to derive at least 10 percent of its electricity from renewable sources, such as solar and wind energy, by 2011. The law also requires that the amount increase to 15 percent by 2015, and to 20 percent by 2020.
Marks said UNM’s membership in the group hurts solar energy developments in the state.
“UNM, through the lobbying organization that lobbies at the PRC, aims to get rid of their solar targets,” he said. “If they’re successful, utilities will not be required to deploy any particular amount of solar energy … To me, that just seems wrongly headed to a couple of directions.”
The main reason NMIEC and UNM have been trying to counter the law is that the development of solar energy would cost them a lot, Marks said.
“Basically they’re just interested in the lowest initial cost. They don’t want to invest one penny on renewable energy. They want to keep utility rates as low as possible … I believe, and I think most members of the UNM community would join me, in saying that making reasonable investments in solar energy is a good idea for the long term.”
Although he said the University has been trying to develop renewable energy on campus, Marks said UNM should not be supporting NMIEC’s efforts.
“I think UNM does some good things in terms of energy efficiency on campus,” he said. “But why are they saying that in the state of New Mexico — not even just UNM — we should stop pushing for solar energy.”
UNM Sustainability Manager Mary Clark denies Marks’ claims. She said UNM’s affiliation with NMIEC does not affect the continuous solar energy developments on campus.
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“The lobbying firm does not drive utilities initiatives,” she said. “What a Santa Fe firm is saying is not really the same with what we’re planning on doing. They do not drive our agenda nor drive our projects.”
But Clark admitted that solar panel installations on on-campus buildings are “crazy expensive.” She said the recession has slowed down solar projects the University had in mind.
“We have solar energy installations on campus, and we have more in the works,” she said. “We had planned more, but the recession took the air out of it because the money that we had put aside for those projects had to be used for other things. What we are very in favor of is finding the best use for our dollars.”
Still, Clark said the University has installed more solar panels on roofs of buildings, such as the Yale Parking Structure and the Science and Math Learning Center. She said UNM has been working with faculty members’ research projects involving solar energy.
And UNM has also been cooperating with “a donor” for more funding for solar projects, Clark said. But she declined to identify the donor.
Hans Barsun, utilities engineer at UNM’s Physical Plant Department, said solar energy has existed on campus since 2006 when the University installed a solar thermal project in the Mechanical Engineering Building. It is now used for heating and cooling purposes.
Barsun said the University has been spending “about a quarter of a million dollar a year for several years” for solar projects. He said that UNM plans to install solar panels on one building per year in subsequent years starting 2014.
UNM will start installing panels on another building in two months, Barsun said, but he declined to identify which building it is. He said the solar project would be completed by early 2014.
“It will be probably happening in a month or two,” he said. “It takes a number of months for something to actually do something … People always ask us why we don’t have solar panels on every building. We’ll eventually get there.”
Clark said the University plans to start more renewable projects on campus in the future.
“It’s not the only component, but it’s one,” he said. “I would expect that the University would always find ways to produce utilities for campus in the most cost-effective way.”
Marks said solar energy development on campus will garner support from the University community.
“I’ve been invited a couple of times to speak at UNM to classes about renewable energy, and my impression is that the faculty and the students are very supportive of the energy transition,” he said.
And solar projects will save the state’s environment, Marks said.
“Developing New Mexico’s solar resources is actually in the best interest of the state,” he said. “We’ve really got to transition in the next couple of years from fossil fuels to a predominantly renewable energy-based portfolio for electricity. Coal is really bad, and even natural gas is not sustainable environmentally. We have to do something different.”
