Energy Commission Minutes

Minutes of 9/11/2024

September 11th, 2024

Carroll Energy Commission Minutes
Meeting of September 11, 2024 @ 9:00 a.m.
Carroll Town Hall Conference Room
The Carroll Energy Commission mission is to advise, encourage, and facilitate energy conservation, energy efficiency, and clean energy solutions for public buildings and properties, businesses, and resident homes. The Committee shall provide leadership and direction for community education relating to energy and shall propose and explore funding for local energy projects.
These minutes of the Town of Carroll Energy Commission have been recorded by its Secretary. Though believed to be accurate and correct they are subject to additions, deletions, and corrections by the Energy Commission at its next meeting when the Commission votes its final approval of the minutes. They are being made available at this time to conform to the requirements of New Hampshire RSA 91-A:2.

Minutes recorded by Imre Szauter, Secretary

Commission members in attendance: Member Vern Amirault, Member and Select Board Representative John Greer (joined meeting at 9:50 a.m.), Vice Chair and Secretary Imre Szauter, and Chair Bill Vecchio. Member Brian Mycko was absent and excused.

Members of the public in attendance via Zoom: Chief Tadd Bailey, Carroll Police Department; Chief Jeff Duncan, Twin Mountain Fire-Rescue Department; Steve Lieber, President & Owner, Affinity LED Lighting; Xavier Ocadiz, Project Lead, Affinity LED Lighting; Jason Wiggins, Project Developer, Affinity LED Lighting; and Melissa Elander, North Country Energy Circuit Rider, Clean Energy New Hampshire (CENH) (joined meeting at 9:10 a.m.).

Members of the public in attendance in person: none

The meeting was called to order at 9:00 a.m. by Chair Vecchio and the Zoom conference feature was enabled. It should be noted that the Zoom conference terminated twice spontaneously during the meeting, but both times the call was resumed successfully.

Chair Vecchio invited all attendees to rise and join in the Pledge of Allegiance.

Chair Vecchio welcomed everyone to the meeting and invited participants to introduce themselves.

Chair Vecchio stated he would entertain a motion on the September 3, 2024 meeting minutes. Chair Vecchio motioned to accept the minutes as written. Vice Chair Szauter seconded the motion. It was discovered that with only three members in attendance and Member Amirault not present at the September 3, 2024 meeting, there wasn’t a quorum to vote on the motion. Therefore, Chair Vecchio withdrew his motion and Vice Chair Szauter withdrew his second. Chair Vecchio stated that when Member Greer arrived, he would once again call for a motion on the September 3, 2024 minutes.

Under New Business, Chair Vecchio opened a discussion on the Affinity LED Lighting audit results.

Steve Lieber explained the audit process, including the reconciliation step with Eversource Energy’s legacy inventory, used to bill the town for the streetlights and floodlights in use on public property. He proposed a comprehensive review of the map created from the audit process and suggested this would be the time to make additions, deletions, or modifications to what appears on the map.

Attendees discussed the color-coded map, showing current streetlight intensities, locations of missing streetlights (town paying for a streetlight but none at that location), locations of streetlights that were not on the ledger, and locations of unknowns.

Steve Lieber identified eleven (11) Eversource Energy-provided LED streetlights that were installed as a result of service requests for replacement of malfunctioning high-pressure sodium (HPS) streetlights. He stated that the town would be given these units for potential reuse at other locations, while the remaining HPS streetlights and floodlights would be processed for disposal.

After extensive discussion, Energy Commission members decided to follow a recommendation to update all streetlights along main roadways to 50W LED streetlights and 18W streetlights along secondary roads, and ensuring all intersections are illuminated. Xavier Ocadiz will provide an update summary and map to the Energy Commission for review and approval.

Vice Chair Szauter agreed to contact the Bretton Woods Property Owners Association regarding town-paid streetlights that may be located on private property.

The Zoom conference meeting was terminated at 11:05 a.m. and the Energy Commission paused the meeting for a short break.

Following restart of the meeting at 11:21 a.m., Chair Vecchio opened up Old Business topics for discussion.

Under Old Business, Member Amirault suggested reconsideration of the September 3, 2024 meeting minutes, as Member Greer attended that meeting. Chair Vecchio made a motion to approve the September 3, 2024 minutes as written. Member Greer seconded the motion. With no discussion, the motion passed with 3 AYES, 0 NAYS, and 1 ABSTENTION.

Under Old Business, Vice Chair Szauter distributed an update on 2024 Energy Commission expenditures to date. Discussion on anticipated expenses before the end of the year resulted in members agreeing that requesting the same budget for 2025 was acceptable. Chair Vecchio will send the request to Administrative Assistant, Megan Basnar in preparation for the October 8, 2024 Energy Commission budget presentation at the Select Board meeting.

Under Old Business, Chair Vecchio opened a discussion on possible warrant articles to be drafted by the Energy Commission for inclusion on the March 2025 warrant. Chair Vecchio provided copies of warrant articles from other towns. A total of three warrant articles should be considered:
1. Warrant article to place a specific dollar amount (suggested $10,000) into the Energy Efficiency Capital Reserve Fund, created by voters at the March 2024 Town Vote session and seeded with $10,000.
2. Warrant article to establish a Solar Capital Reserve Fund and place a specific dollar amount in the fund to provide for operational, maintenance, and equipment replacement.
3. Warrant article to authorize and fund installation of a solar PV array on the Public Safety building, if the NH Department of Energy (NH DOE) Municipal Solar Grant Program funding request submitted by the town on July 30, 2024 is approved.

During the warrant article discussion, Fire Chief Duncan entered the meeting to seek clarification on the Affinity LED Lighting streetlight conversion program and the process followed by the Energy Commission and Affinity LED Lighting.

Members agreed to continue the warrant article discussion at the next meeting.

Under Old Business, Chair Vecchio opened a discussion on the NH DOE Commercial & Industrial Solar Incentive Program. There was no update on this program.

Under Old Business, Chair Vecchio opened a discussion on the NH DOE request for supplemental information on RFP 2024-006 Municipal Solar Grant Program – Carroll. A copy of the September 3, 2024 letter sent to NH DOE Administrative Assistant to Commissioner Chicoine regarding their request to identify funding sources for items not covered by the grant was distributed.

Under Old Business, Chair Vecchio opened a discussion on the CENH battery storage study. There was no update on this program.

Under Other, Member Greer requested that Vice Chair Szauter provide the Select Board with an update on the LED streetlight project at the September 17, 2024 meeting.

Under Other, Chair Vecchio asked how many members were interested in attending the November 1, 2024 CENH Local Energy Solutions (LES) conference in Manchester. All members responded they were interested. Registration and car pooling will be discussed at the October 2024 Energy Commission meeting.

Under Other, Member Amirault asked about positions within the Energy Commission. It was felt the Select Board should review current terms and either reappoint or replace those whose terms expire in October. Vice Chair Szauter’s term expires in October 2024. Chair Vecchio stated that he felt the chair, vice chair, and secretary positions should be reviewed at the October meeting.

With no additional items for discussion, Chair Vecchio entertained a motion for adjournment. Chair Vecchio motioned to adjourn. Member Greer seconded the motion. With no discussion, the motion passed unanimously with 4 AYES and 0 NAYS and the meeting was adjourned at 12:40 p.m.

Respectfully submitted,

Imre Szauter, Vice Chair and Secretary