Marine. Criss Micer
Vice Mayor
lancaster ca
it's positively clear Mark V. Bozigian City Manager
September 17, 2018
Brad Worster, Commission Agreement Officer
California Energy Commission
1516 Ninth Street, 1st Floor
Sacramento, California 95814
Re: Letter of Commitment - Phase II of the Lancaster Advanced Energy Community Project Dear Mr. Worster:
The City of Lancaster, California is pleased to provide this Letter of Commitment to the California Energy Commission for Phase II of the Lancaster Advanced Energy Community (AEC) project. This project is a collaboration of the City of Lancaster and the ZNE Alliance, a nonprofit alliance of organizations committed to developing Zero Net Energy, Zero Net Emissions, and Zero Net Carbon communities throughout California and beyond.
Lancaster is the first city in America to announce a clear Net-Zero Energy vision, "to procure and produce more renewable energy within the City than is consumed within the City by the Year 2020." The City's commitment to a ZNE strategy emphasizing solar and energy storage has been demonstrated through adoption of the first-in-the-nation residential solar mandate, the most progressive solar mandate in the state.
By 2018, the City was 93% of the way to achieving its goal with total of 496 MW of solar deployed, and anticipates surpassing the Net Zero Energy goal by autumn, 2018. Lancaster is the first in the state to offer online solar permitting and was home to one of the first ZNE homes in the state. More recently, we have adopted an electric vehicle ordinance mandating that all city bus fleet purchases going forward must be electric - and have contracts to procure 87 e-buses. To further advance our ZNE Community vision, the City formed a Community Choice Aggregation (CCA) in November 2014 and launched customer operations in November 2015 as Lancaster Choice Energy (LCE). Forming a CCA has enabled Lancaster to procure and construct more affordable, claner power gencration, set tariffs, and offer a robust set of ZNE and Integrated Demand Side Management (IDSM) customer programs. LCE has just received CPUC approval to administer energy efficiency programs funded through ratepayer funds, which further increases the opportunity to leverage the AEC project.
The high penetration of solar energy in our City requires an equal commitment to energy storage and enabling flexible load capacity to firm renewable intermittency and ensure safe, reliable and affordable power to our residents. To meet this need, we have worked with the AEC project team to develop multiple programs and projects that will be deployed during Phase II. Specifically, the Lancaster AEC Phase II Project will advance four components:
1. Scaling ZNE Residential Microgrids: Throughout Phase I of the project, the City of Lancaster worked closely with the ZNE Alliance to design, plan and permit the 78 unit, affordable housing, residential microgrid, called Avenuc I. In Phase II of the project, the ZNE Alliance team will support the construction of the Avenue I microgrid, and develop the tariff and billing system for the subdivision. In addition, the ZNE Alliance team will support Lancaster Housing Authority to deploy the Avenue I design, DER configurations and microgrid system to 167 other affordable units in the Sierra Highway development. This project will also include long duration flywheel energy storage to provide both grid services and back-up power in the event of a grid outage, deploying this cutting-edge technology in an 44933 Fern Avenue • Lancaster, CA 93534 • 661.723.6000
www.cltyoflancasterca.org
September 17, 2018
California Energy Commission
innovative setting. These communities will serve as blueprints for additional public housing developments in the City and thus this project will affect over 1,000 homes in total.
2. Green District Program: The Lancaster Green District program is an innovative storage deployment strategy that allows LCE to capture value while reducing demand charges for end users. Eligible customers receive a fixed percentage of demand charge reduction savings, while LCE uses the remaining battery capacity to participate in low-risk grid services markets while avoiding expensive procurements costs. The Green District Program plans to deploy at least 2.5 MWh of energy storage within Lancaster city limits at 10+ site hosts.
3. ZNE Multi-Microgrid School Deployment: The Multi-Microgrid School Deployment harnesses storage installed through Proposition 39 funds to create additional resiliency benefits in the Lancaster School District buildings. By providing reliable electricity in the event of an emergency, this microgrid network creates security and increases resiliency, the benefits of which most impact Lancaster's youth.
4. Lancaster Virtual Power Plant (VPP): The Lancaster VPP works with the LCE cloud-based Energy Resource Information System (ERIS) to aggregate and manage the ZNE residential Microgrids, the Green District Program participants, and the ZNE network of school microgrids, and other DERs as appropriate. The goals of this program are to: 1) Operate DERs to reduce energy costs for LCE and its customers, informed by data from the Lancaster Energy Resource Information System, 2) Increase the resilience of the distribution grid and capture stacked value streams from providing grid services, 3) Increase the penetration of clean energy resources, 4) Assist customers in managing their energy costs, and 5) Support Zero Net Carbon goals by optimizing local solar, storage, EVs/chargers and other flexible loads. The flexible load created by this VPP will be key to help manage our high percentage of renewables.
Local Match Funding: During Phase II of this project, the ZNE Alliance partners, in close collaboration with the City of Lancaster, will build on existing City efforts than can be captured as match funding for this project. These projects have received all necessary permits and approvals and will be moving forward without reservation. Match funding provided by the City in the amount of $5,025,000 will include:
Green District Energy Storage deployments: The City plans to deploy at least $1.2M of funding for battery PPAs for the Green District Program over the grant period, from 2019-2024. • Avenue I Affordable Development: In mid-2019, the City will break ground on the Avenue I residential microgrid. The City expenditures on this project between February 2019 and December 2024 will be an estimated $1.6 million for solar PV and energy storage, as well as advanced distribution infrastructure.
• Sierra Highway Affordable Development: The City is to complete the Sierra Highway residential microgrid during the project period. The City commits $2.2M for solar PV and energy storage, as well as advanced distribution infrastructure, to support this deployment. • In line with the Electric Vehicle (EV) Planning and Business Model Development work completed in Phase I. Lancaster plans to spend a minimum of $25K to expand EV infrastructure City-wide.
We are excited to participate in this pioneering effort to deploy a network of intelligent energy storage renewable generation, energy efficiency, EVs, and load management strategies to reduce energy costs, an improve safety and reliability.
September 17, 2018
California Energy Commission
We look forward to working with the California Energy Commission and the ZNE Alliance in our goal to become a Net Zero Energy City. Please do not hesitate to reach me at (661) 723-6133 if you have any questions or require additional information.
Sincerely,
Mark V. Bozigiat
City Manager
MB:kw