us army ft bliss rfi for microgrids
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Request for Information Net Zero Energy Fort Bliss: Microgrids to Support Efficient Energy Usage
and the Integration of Renewable Energy BACKGROUND: The Army Energy Program is expanding to meet the requirements of Congressional legislation and Executive Orders which mandate change in our nation’s energy consumption and production. The Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT05) requires Federal agencies to purchase 7.5% of their energy from renewable sources by 2013; Executive Order 13423 requires that half of this renewable energy come from new sources; and the National Defense Authorization Act of 2007 (NDAA07) requires that 25% of DoD’s total electricity come from renewable sources by 2025. Currently, the Army derives approximately 2.1% of its energy from renewable energy sources and must increase the amount of renewable energy utilized to support its operations. The energy conservation and renewable energy projects proposed for Fort Bliss will help to establish a model installation-based energy security approach for implementing the Army Energy Security Implementation Strategy (AESIS) and overall reduction of energy use and cost. AESIS is a coordinated Army-wide response to the growing importance of improved energy efficiency, greater alternative energy use and heightened energy security for the Army and the nation. The Army energy security mission is to make energy a consideration for all Army activities to reduce demand, increase efficiency, seek alternative sources, and create a culture of energy accountability while sustaining or enhancing operational capabilities. Fort Bliss has positioned itself to lead the Army in these aspects and continues to lead with aggressive pursuit of energy security. In its role as an Army energy leader, Fort Bliss has established the goal of becoming a Net Zero Energy Installation (NZEI) by 2015. To do this, Fort Bliss must aggressively conserve energy and also generate as much renewable energy as it consumes, measured over the course of a year. The legislated energy mandates and changes to the cultural initiatives support Army-wide goals of improving its resiliency and endurance as a military force. These include: 1) Surety: Preventing loss of access to power and fuel sources. 2) Supply: Accessing alternative and renewable energy sources available to the installation. 3) Sustainability: Promoting support for the Army’s mission, its community, and the environment. 4) Sufficiency: Providing adequate power for critical missions. 5) Survivability: Ensuring resilience in energy systems. The Army is interested in developing this program through industry partnerships where private firms will design, build, own and operate large scale renewable energy or energy management facilities on Army land, with a Power Purchase Agreement, or similar instrument, as compensation to the owner. The Army has established a framework for analysis to help meet these goals. Initial feasibility studies have evaluated several renewable energy technologies for their potential contribution toward a NZEI strategy. Microgrids offer many attractive aspects with regard to the efficient management of power, power islands, integration of renewable energy, energy storage, power
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conditioning, energy surety and security, and backup power. Fort Bliss is looking for viable and affordable approaches to achieve the beneficial features of microgrids and integrate them into a comprehensive acquisition strategy for the Net Zero Energy program. To augment our market research for viable technology and economic approaches, Fort Bliss is looking for information on microgrids and associated microgrid technology that is focused at the individual building level, building cluster level, and linking building clusters. El Paso Electric (EPE) is the serving regulated utility for Fort Bliss with service in both New Mexico and Texas. Under current regulations, any Power Purchase Agreement for power in this region of Texas will need to involve EPE. PURPOSE AND NEED FOR INFORMATION The purpose of this Request for Information (RFI) is to solicit input from industry to be considered by the U.S. Army in determining a course of future action. The Army seeks industry input regarding technology capabilities, project financing capabilities, risk factors and legal or administrative processes which should be expected while developing this project. The Army is interested in information that will help to understand the true opportunities to be found and challenges to be faced if this concept is further developed. This is solely a request for information and not a Request for Proposal (RFP). 1. Technology:
a. Technologies desired are those that have the smallest environmental impact, i.e. the smallest carbon footprint.
b. Describe any potential impacts of your technology that could be limiting for environmental or safety reasons. For example, issues associated with hazardous chemicals and other materials, potential for catastrophic failure of high energy density systems, radio frequency or other electronic noise generation, acoustic noise, etc.
c. Describe a technical approach to achieve measurable efficiency gains for a building or building cluster that consumes 1 MW average power with 2MW peak loads that would incorporate grid connected energy as well as distributed renewable energy generation from sources such as solar photovoltaic, wind, fuel cells, etc.
d. Describe the features / capability of your technical approach to incorporate power conditioning, management of the grid connection, islanding, “black start” capability in case of a wide spread loss of grid power backup power sources, and energy storage from intermittent renewable energy sources such as photovoltaic panels, concentrated solar thermal, and wind.
e. The Army is in the process of conducting programmatic National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) analyses for renewable energy generation. It will be the responsibility of the developer to fund and coordinate any additional site-specific NEPA actions for the proposed facility that may be required.
2. Technology Maturity
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a. Describe the features of your microgrid concept. b. With respect to the Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 1
c. What is the impact to retrofitting your microgrid components into new and legacy facilities?
scale, what is the maturity of your microgrid technologies and controls?
d. What are the control methods / processes that you use for automation and/or control of your system?
e. What is the operation and maintenance requirement for your system? f. What is the expected availability of your system? g. What is the expected lifetime of your system? This may be described in the lifetime and
replacement frequency for specific system components. h. What is the commercial history of your technology?
3. Financing / Economic Feasibility
a. Although microgrid applications are strongly dependent on specific applications, what is the Rough Order of Magnitude (ROM) cost range per square foot for administrative office space that can be expected for your technology? The Army is seeking an understanding of the cost drivers and relative costs associated with microgrids in order to establish an acquisition strategy that is economically viable.
b. Given the willingness of the Army to consider public-private ventures to finance energy projects, what ideas do you have with regard to private financing of microgrid projects through contracting instruments such as Power Purchase Agreements (PPA), Enhanced Use Leases (EUL), Energy Savings Performance Contract (ESPC), etc. where the Army provides land and will pay the investment over time via energy savings or purchase of the commodity?
RESPONSE INSTRUCTIONS Responses are limited to nine (9) pages total (12 point font, 1 inch margins). Include a brief, one (1) page summary of company background and relevant experience in renewable energy project development with your responses. The remaining eight (8) pages shall be used to respond to the RFI questions. Respondents may submit responses to all or a portion of the RFI questions. A copy of a representative project development plan can be provided for illustrative purposes and will not count against the page limitation. The email submittal should have the title of the Request for Information (for example, “Solar Photovoltaic or Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) Generation Facilities”) in the subject line of the email to ensure proper review.
1 Technology Readiness Level (TRL) is a method to assess the maturity of new technologies through experimentation, refinement, and increasingly realistic testing. Once the technology is sufficiently proven, it can be incorporated into a system/subsystem. The scale is from 1 to 9 with 1 being basic technology research and 9 being system test launch & operations.
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Submittals to this Request for Information or questions posed for clarification should be emailed to the following email addresses: Melissa Garcia Mission & Installation Contracting Command Fort Bliss, TX [email protected] and BJ Tomlinson Fort Bliss Garrison Directorate of Public Works Renewable Energy and Sustainability Program Manager [email protected] The maximum file size email plus attachment that can be received is 20Mb. DUE DATE Responses are required to be submitted no later than 10:00 a.m. Mountain Time, October 7, 2011 via email to Ms Melissa Garcia ([email protected]) and Mr BJ Tomlinson ([email protected]).
BUSINESS SENSITIVE, PROPRIETARY, OR OTHERWISE CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION Because information received in response to this RFI may be used to structure future solicitations and/or otherwise be made available to the public, respondents are strongly advised NOT to include any information in their responses, which may be considered business sensitive, proprietary, or otherwise confidential. However, if your company chooses to submit any business sensitive, proprietary, or otherwise confidential information, it must be marked as proprietary or restricted data in the response. Should Fort Bliss receive FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) requests for responses, all Responders will be contacted for approval prior to release.
Questions and Answers Questions regarding this Request for Information shall be submitted through email to Ms Melissa Garcia ([email protected]) and Mr BJ Tomlinson ([email protected]) as soon as possible, but not later than 1:00 PM Mountain Time on August 23, 2011. The email with questions should have the title of the Request for Information (for example, “Solar Photovoltaic or Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) Generation Facilities”) in the subject line of the email to ensure proper review. Answers will be posted no later than 5:00 PM Mountain Time on September 12, 2011.