ARRA spurs reactivation of state energy chapter

What the Providence Geeks did for information technology, Jo Lee would like to do for renewable energy in Rhode Island.
Just as the computer-savvy Geeks do, Lee said, clean-energy advocates are being invited to informally gather once a month so “we can network and learn from each other,” on the first Tuesday of every month at 6 p.m. She suggested that a Rhode Island “green” company could be profiled each month, and the energy enthusiasts then could discuss various aspects of the subject company’s energy initiatives.
A member of Providence Geeks who has worked in the IT sector for more than 20 years, Lee also is vice chairwoman of the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association (NESEA).
She said she is in the process of reactivating the group’s Rhode Island chapter – one unintended byproduct of the federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA). The federal stimulus package will pump billions of dollars into renewable energy programs and conservation across the nation, generating new interest and resources to end America’s dependence on foreign oil.
NESEA – based in Greenfield, Mass., and serving 10 states from Maine to Maryland – has been in existence for about 30 years, she said, although its activities in Rhode Island have been limited of late. Its members are “a very passionate group,” Lee added, committed to “driving the industry forward through discourse and debate.”
The monthly NESEA sessions will be held at Everyman, the newly opened café located next to the R.I. Economic Development Corporation (EDC) headquarters in the American Locomotive Works (Alco) complex on Iron Horse Way, off Valley Street in Providence. At the first gathering April 7, Lee said, the featured speaker will be Steve Turner, of the Constructive Technologies Group in Providence.
Small business is a key segment of the community that Lee is hoping to involve in the energy discussions. “It’s imperative that those small businesses in the green sector get their voices heard,” she said.
The federal stimulus package includes financial incentives for small businesses, including those in the green trade. The package includes a grant program that will distribute $9.5 billion over the next two years, allowing developers for the first time to apply for direct federal financing of up to 30 percent of a renewable energy project’s cost.
Fred Unger, president of the Heartwood Group Inc. in Providence, said sources to buy the energy credits, such as large financial institutions, dried up due to Wall Street’s problems. Direct grants should “remove a lot of the uncertainty and risk” attached to the tax incentives, he said.
According to a 39-page report on the federal stimulus package prepared by the fiscal staff of the R.I. State Budget Office, Rhode Island “could potentially receive” $25.8 million for weatherization assistance and $24.3 million for the State Energy Program for renewable energy and energy efficiency programs through federal fiscal year 2010.
The State Energy Program now receives about $400,000 a year. Of the $24.3 million, the report said, the R.I. Office of Energy Resources could receive $2.9 million, some $3.9 million would go to the 33 communities with populations of less than 35,000, and $17 million would go to the six communities with more than 35,000 people. •