The following is a transcript of the July 15, 2024, episode of Public Power Now. Learn more about subscribing to Public Power Now at Publicpower.org/Podcasts. Some quotes may have been edited for clarity.
Paul Ciampoli
Welcome to the latest episode of Public Power Now. I'm Paul Ciampoli, APPA's News Director. Our guest on this episode is Paul Zummo, Director for Research and Development at APPA. Paul is here to provide an update on activities related to APPA's Demonstration of Energy and Efficiency Developments program. The deadline to apply for DEED grants is fast approaching, with applications due no later than August 15. Only current APPA DEED members are eligible to apply for the grants. Paul, thanks for returning as a guest on the podcast.
Paul Zummo
Thanks, Paul. Great to be here.
Paul Ciampoli
Paul, I'm assuming that most of our listeners are aware of the DEED program, but for those who may not be familiar with it, could you provide an overview of the program?
Paul Zummo
DEED stands for Demonstration of Energy and Efficiency Developments and is APPA's primary R&D program established in 1980. It was really established to give public power utilities an opportunity to have R&D funding as EPRI, which was created in 1972, seemed to be geared more towards larger utilities and to investor-owned utilities. So that was really the genesis for DEED and it has been going strong for now 44 years and we have provided over $25 million in grant funding. The primary thing I guess that people know DEED for is the grant funding -- applying for funding for innovative projects up to $125,000 -- gives utilities an opportunity to match their funds and implement innovative programs that also benefit other utilities.
But it's not just grants. We also have internships. We provide $4,000 in funding for internships and $4,000 as well for scholarships and $2,000 for line worker training. We also have other products that are available for DEED members. One thing to note about DEED is it's a separately funded program. So it has a separate dues structure apart from main APPA dues.
So you do have to be an APPA member to be a DEED member and about 2/3 of APPA members are DEED members. We have about 950 DEED members as of now. So if you're not a member and you're interested in applying we’d love to hear from you as well.
Paul Ciampoli
My next question relates to examples of projects previously funded through DEED grants. Can you describe the general types of projects that are funded or if you have examples of specific utility specific projects that would also work?
Paul Zummo
I can get into some recent examples of projects that I think show the trend and what has been funded. NCPA, a joint action agency in in Northern California, has actually had two DEED grant projects that are completed. They're investigating converting a natural gas plant into a hydrogen plant. It's already able to co-fire. What they've done is they had one grant first to kind of look into the feasibility of it. And the second grant was aimed at getting a little bit more into detail on how they could implement the change and go to fully firing with hydrogen power and they actually now just have recently applied for it and gotten a third grant to continue that investigation. So that's just one example. We've gotten a lot of projects, as you may anticipate, dealing with electric vehicles and just the electrification of the energy industry.
When it comes to EVs -- a few examples -- we've had toolkits developed several years ago from AMP and from the Iowa Association of Municipal Utilities. And both of those were really efforts to give other utilities an opportunity to plug in some numbers and see how different electrification scenarios might play out. And Iowa Association of Municipal Utilities has a current grant, which will be another toolkit, that will be released here in the next year or so. This is really furthering that research and allowing utilities to enter in their data and see if there is electrification where they may need to have upgrades to substations and things of that nature. We've also had a couple of grants related to used cars, for example.
MMWEC had a EV used car program just to see that second generation of electric vehicles and how that used car market may develop. Northern Wasco in Oregon -- they had a rural ride and drive program along with several other utilities. That was a program through Forth [an EV company] which gave people in rural areas an opportunity to test drive EVs because people in rural areas have a hard time accessing EVs and test driving it. And when you test drive an EV, you're much more likely to purchase an EV. So that was the reasoning behind that program.
When it comes to energy storage, we've also had several projects in recent years. I was just out in Burbank as part of a ribbon cutting ceremony where they have just initiated an energy storage project and what's different about this energy storage project -- it's an iron flow battery, so it's a different technology. And it's paired with solar, and it's part of a facility that Burbank has developed really to have lower emission generation technology. So it's part of a larger facility and so that facility is up and running now. We've also had a lot in cybersecurity, as you might imagine. MEAN, a Joint Action Agency in Nebraska, worked with several of its members to assess their cyber readiness. And so that was one way for MEAN -- Municipal Energy Agency of Nebraska -- to engage with its members to basically see where it was, where these members were, these smaller utilities, when it came to cyber preparedness.
I'll even throw out the ERT – the eReliability tracker. That's a tracker that about....500 [APPA] paid members were subscribed to. That was established through a DEED grant, so APPA itself has benefited its members through DEED projects.
Paul Ciampoli
I also wanted to mention to our listeners with respect to the Burbank storage project, that was one of the topics that I discussed with Mandip Samra, CEO and GM at Burbank Power utility, recently. So I would encourage listeners interested in further details on that project to go back and listen to that episode. So I would imagine, Paul, that if you're not a DEED member and you're perhaps thinking about moving forward with trying to become a DEED member, one question that may come to mind is what the grant application process is. Could you provide additional details on that?
Paul Zummo
Yeah, I'd love to talk about the application process. One of the things about the DEED application process compared to some of the federal grant reporting requirements is it's relatively simple and relatively easy compared to some of these other grant projects. First of all, to get set up, you just need to e-mail [email protected]. You get access to our portal, and once you're on that portal, that's where you can download the application form.
And as I said it's much simpler. You don't have to write essays – paragraphs -- not essays. If you printed out the application in Word form, it would just be a handful of pages. Here's what we're really looking for in an application. We want the utility to tell us what is the project, what are you hoping to accomplish? What are your anticipated learnings, outcomes? What benefits will you have for other DEED members? That's an important aspect of DEED.
The project isn't just meant to benefit just the utility recipient. It's really meant to also provide learning outcomes that are applicable to other DEED members and to other public power utilities. So that's an important thing to note there. We'll want a project budget -- roughly how much everything is going to cost, where the money is going to. Another important aspect of DEED and DEED projects is that at least 50% of the funding for for a DEED project has to come elsewhere...DEED will not want 100% of the project cost, so it will fund no more than 50%.
We also want to know what deliverables you have. At a bare minimum, all utilities will have to file a report detailing the learning outcomes and everything I just talked about. But other utilities might have a toolkit, there maybe something else attached to the project that always helps it get across the finish line in terms of approval.
Another important thing to note for an application is that we're here to help. APPA staff is happy to help utilities as they go through the application process. As Paul mentioned, we have until August 15 for this cycle, so feel free to reach out to us if you have any questions, if you're not sure the project is appropriate. But also we can put you in contact with one of the DEED board members. Each region of APPA is represented by a a member on the DEED board. So we could put you in touch with the appropriate board member to also help guide you through the process. We're also looking at projects in specific areas. I outlined a few before -- electric vehicles...or electrification in general, cybersecurity, integrating renewables, storage. So if you have a project in that area, I would definitely encourage you to consider a DEED grant.
And another thing to emphasize here, it doesn't have to be a completely new project. What I mean by that is even if you've already begun work on a project, even if it's relatively mature and it's something that you've been doing for a while, we're happy to look at your application and consider providing funding to help you get it across the finish line.
When you do apply, just note that all of the grant applications will then go to the DEED board members which I just mentioned before. At least a month after the deadline is complete this year...so, for example, the fall meeting is in early October. So the board members would then vote on those projects and you will be notified soon thereafter. So let's say mid-October, if you apply for this cycle. And then after that we would just execute the contract and that's the life of a DEED application.
Paul Ciampoli
I think you've alluded or touched upon this to some degree, but I wanted to give you the opportunity to kind of drill down in terms of the benefits of a public power utility being a DEED member.
Paul Zummo
The notable ones I've already talked about -- it's the project funding, it's the internship funding, scholarship funding, but there's other benefits. You don't have to be involved in a project to get the benefits. Probably one of the most popular ones is the DEED project library. So all DEED members have access on the APPA website to the DEED project library. And that library has every DEED project that's ever been completed as well as DEED projects that are still ongoing. Some of the older ones, the final reports aren't available, but you can e-mail us...you'll at least know the titles and the names of the utilities who have done a project.
It's one way, A -- if you are doing a project -- to know if it's already been done, but also then B, if you're just interested in the topic and want to see what has been done that's a great resource and you can download the final reports and anything else that is involved with the project.
Also another big membership benefit is discounts on DEED products. I mentioned toolkits before, so those toolkits are generally available to DEED members if they're not free, they're at least at a discounted price, whereas APPA members who are not DEED members would have to pay a little bit more and then non-APPA members would pay at a price above that. I mentioned the ERT as an example -- the eReliability tracker -- DEED members are able to subscribe at a discounted cost because of DEED if they're DEED members.
And then webinars -- all of our webinars -- and we try to do them roughly every month and 1/2 or so. The webinars themselves are free for DEED members, but usually at a cost then for non-DEED APPA members.
Paul Ciampoli
With respect to the DEED library, I can certainly attest to the fact of its value and ease of use. I've used it for several years. I just wanted to highlight that for our listeners.
So Paul, last question for you. As you know, each year APPA’s DEED program recognizes innovative utility projects with its Energy Innovator Award. This year's award recipients were Tennessee public power utilities CDE Lightband and EPB, along with the New York Power Authority. Can you offer additional details about this award, including what the DEED program looks for when it recognizes the work of public power utilities that receive the award.
Paul Zummo
The Energy Innovator Award -- we open up nominations and you can self nominate, usually towards the beginning of the year. And we recognize those utilities at the National Conference. And the important thing to note about this is that while you have to be a DEED member to nominate yourself and to receive the Energy Innovator Award, it doesn't have to be a DEED project itself...you just have to be a DEED member --so it could be something apart from any DEED project you may have.
And really, what we're trying to do -- it's similar to DEED itself, but recognizing projects that show advancement, innovation, new learnings that provide manifest benefits to the customers of the utilities, who are awarded. And so we're looking again for the types of projects that are going to advance public power forward. The nominations, as I said, are done in [the] early part of the year and then we have a panel of judges and these judges can come from public power utilities, but often they come outside of the public power world. We've had, for example, former FERC Commissioners act as judges. So they judge the nominations on a grading scale, and we recognize those who have achieved the highest scores. Just briefly touching upon the ones that you mentioned that were recognized this year -- for example, the NYPA project was one that -- I'll give the exact name – optical ground wire sensor-based monitoring for overhead lines.
So it was a way of using fiber optic sensing that identifies power line conditions both weather related -- if there's impending ice storms or things of that nature, or perhaps even sabotage. So the project focused on a transmission line and identifies problems before they happen. And so it's a way to anticipate impending issues with power lines. The Chattanooga project is...a microgrid project related to police services and the fire department. So really maintaining the resilience and reliability for essential services. And then the CDE grid resiliency program was a project that uses kind of a data-driven approach to look at 29 different electric distribution circuits.
So really again something...using data and AI to ensure the reliability of circuits in areas where they're in disadvantaged communities, so there's that element to it as well. So all of these projects that I talked about, I think what's neat about them and what's true of DEED in general is it's the balancing of the old with the new. I mean, we're talking about reliability and resilience things, like keeping the lights on, right. We always talk about that in the context of electric power -- that we want to keep the lights on.
But finding new ways to ensure that reliability and to maintain that resilience, I think that's kind of what the heart of DEED is and what the heart of the Energy Innovator Award is all about.
Paul Ciampoli
Thanks, Paul. So just a final reminder for our listeners to this episode that the August 15 deadline is rapidly approaching for DEED grants and additional details about the DEED program are available on APPA’s website. Paul, thanks again for joining us.
Paul Zummo
Thank you very much, Paul.
Paul Ciampoli
Thanks for listening to this episode of Public Power Now, which is produced by Julio Guerrero, Graphic and Digital Designer at APPA. I'm Paul Ciampoli. We'll be back next week with more from the world of public power.
