Valley Green Energy Working Group Meeting Aug 12, 2026

Okay, we are now recording. Um, pursuant to chapter 2 of the acts of 2025, this meeting will be conducted via remote means. Members of the public who wish to access the meeting remotely may do so via Zoom or by telephone. No in-person attendance of members of the public will be permitted, but every effort will be made to ensure that the public can adequately access the proceedings in real time via technological means. This is the regular meeting of the Valley Green Energy working group. And today we are joined by Henry H. Hearnden um who will um engage us in conversation. But before we get to Henry um I just want to see if we have any public which we do not. So no public comment. Um but I do want to approve the minutes and just get that out of the way for um the minutes from the meeting of July 23rd which were in your packet. to approve a second. >> All right, just give me one second and then a vote voice vote in no particular order. A googlia. >> Uh I >> while >> yes >> and I am also a yes. So the minutes are approved. All right. And with that I will turn this over now to Henry. We want to welcome you so much for joining us. I didn't know if you do you have a presentation or something that you'd like to share or >> Yeah, I have some slides and maybe before I get into the slides, it might be a little bit helpful for me just to uh better understand the group a little bit and and the folks in the room and uh your maybe perspective or goals on community power or community choice aggregation. >> Sure. Well, why don't we first um introduce ourselves? Why don't we start with that? So, Bob, I'll start with you. >> Okay. Hello, Henry. Um, my name is Bob Agolia and I serve as the chair of the select board in Pelum, one of the three towns or two towns in one city that are involved in this aggregation. Um and um you know I'm I'm really anxious to hear I if I understand correctly what you're going to be talking about um the potential for groups like ours, aggregations like ours to really partner or or integrate local locally um sourced power because we and Pelum are in the midst of although the application has not come in yet uh the potential for a very large um installation a solar installation with battery here uh by a company called Pure Sky. >> So really looking forward to hearing uh what you have to offer to us. >> Thanks Bob and Ben. >> I'm Ben While. I'm the director of climate action and project administration for the city of Northampton. Um and we're also interested in stuff that Bob is interested in. >> Um and then Dell, uh why don't you go next? I know you've met Henry before, but go ahead. >> My name is Adele Franks and I'm a citizen member of the working group and I've been involved ever since the idea came up. [laughter] Um, and so, um, I'm a board member of local energy advocates. >> Thank you, Adele and Darcy. And um I have basically the similar credentials to Adele. We we are the community members of this group and uh have a parallel organization called local energy advocates and we've been sitting as non- voting members on this group since it started. >> And I'm Stephanie Chigarella, director of sustainability for the town of Ammerst. Um, I've also been a member of this group since its origins. Uh, well, maybe not origins origins, like when the community members started, but certainly once we convene this group, I've been involved since the beginning. So, um, we're very happy to have you here, Henry. My interests are similar to what others have stated. So, with that, I guess we'll we'll turn it over to you. >> Yeah, thank you. That that's helpful to to get me a little bit oriented. And um my brother actually lives in Northampton, so I'm down there see my niece and nephew from time to time and I I like the area. I'm a I'm a relatively regular visitor. Uh let's see if I can get my screen shared. Try to share the screen and then potentially I can. Is that showing a >> Yep, it's there. >> Okay, great. Um, okay. And just by way of introduction, I'm Henry Hearnen. I'm the executive director of the Community Power Coalition of New Hampshire. We're a nonprofit joint powers agency of uh 68 cities, towns, and counties that have come together to create their own uh nonprofit corporation to manage their aggregation programs collectively. So, we are essentially we are a public power agency that is controlled and owned by our member municipalities and we manage the wholesale energy portfolio on their behalf and supply electricity to um 180,000 retail customers within those member jurisdictions. Um and so yeah, pleased to join the group and talk a little bit about our how we got to where we are and and what it is that we do. Let's see. Um so we were established in uh 2021 incorporated as a joint powers agency. Um that is uh an agreement among and between all of the 65 municipalities and four county members. Um, it sets forth our bylaws, our board of directors, our governance structure, um, you know, uh, all the requirements of our sort of nonprofit corporation and that was approved by the attorney general. um where our membership is open to all cities and towns in the county and um having launched service in 2023, we grew quite quickly to our current scale and you can see sort of our map, our footprint of service area across the state where we are the default provider of electricity and we manage electricity aggregation on behalf of those member communities. Uh we are the second largest electricity provider in the state of New Hampshire. Again, we're not a distribution utility. were just managing the energy portfolio. Eversource and the other distribution utilities continue to own and operate the electric grid uh and deliver that power. And again, we're a public agency, so we're transparent. We're subject to the same right to know requirements as you are and your cities and towns are. So, our board meetings, our committee meetings are open to the public. Our finances and records are all open to the public. Uh we we take our sort of commitment to public service and transparency and accountability very seriously. um and that sort of that local control community governance aspect of what we do. It's a really key part of our mission and vision. Uh so taking this large energy portfolio and and putting it under the purview of public service and public control and accountability, putting those significant revenues uh and cash flows associated with that under the public control um and empowering local decision-making through that is a key part of our mission. So we have about 180,000 uh retail electric customers that we serve electricity for. It's about 1.5 million megawatt hours of annual electricity load and our 2026 revenue was about $170 million in annual revenue. Um I think we're all familiar with the general concept, but um you know we you may say municipal aggregation or community choice aggregation. We say community power in New Hampshire. These are all the same concept. Um, but under our our law, cities, towns, and counties can become the default provider of electricity for residents and businesses, creating more choice for the customers, uh, and allowing more of that local control. Um, so that economy of scale, purchasing power for the energy portfolio can create benefits. Utility will deliver the power. And then there's sort of this range of new programs and benefits that can come with this, whether it's clean energy options, customers choosing 50% or 100% renewable power or some of the other types of energy innovations that more mature um community power markets um get into. So have our legislation referenced here in case anyone wants to take a look at it. Maybe similar or somewhat different to Massachusetts in some ways. Um customers have the choice to come and go from the service. they can opt out back to the utility or choose another electricity provider and we are entirely funded out of the revenue from the sale of electricity. We are not uh authorized to use taxpayer funds of any kind. So there are no tax implications associated with our operations or our service. Um, I talked a little bit about our mission, vision, values, but um, you know, we power New Hampshire communities with local energy solutions, education, and advocacy. We envision a future where communities are empowered to realize their energy goals through innovative and competitive means. Uh and we're really focused on creating value for members by jointly contracting for services, developing projects, programs together, educating the public and the membership. Uh and then being an advocate for communities and customer interests at the legislature and the public utility commission. So a key part of our value is that whereas legislatores are often perhaps dominated by you know investorowned energy companies or utility companies having the a community interest voice that is a technical expert at scale to participate alongside those incumbent utilities or monopolies is um I think a real value that our members appreciate and we're able to help further innovative energy policy frameworks that are good for communities and customers. ers. >> Um, so yeah, we're focused on reducing costs, competitive markets, and innovation, balancing the diverse interests of our members. Many of them are very motivated by clean energy and renewable energy, and several of them have 100% renewable energy goals. Um and through this model, the one of the most sort of amazing things to experience over the past five years or so has been the transfer of knowledge from the power sector to the communities that sit on our board and sit on our committees. You know, the energy markets are very technical and complex. We have the ISO New England. We have, you know, federal rules and markets. We have local state regulations. Um and you know, you can be in this this industry for decades and to keep learning. And one of the things we've done is we've sort of lifted the hood and created an enormous amount of education for our communities about how does England actually work. What does it mean to manage an electricity portfolio? How does the market work? Um how can we actively participate in that market or even shape that market towards our local interests? So there's a real empowerment factor um in this model. Um, and it's part of the reason I think we have so many engaged and dedicated volunteers. So, of those 60 communities, you know, they each have one or two member representatives. They come to our annual membership meeting, they elect our board, many of them sit on our committees. Um, so they're very engaged and um, yeah, like many of you, you know, members of the community volunteers, some members of municipal staff or select boards or city councils, they're the the folks that, you know, we serve and that, uh, govern us. Um, so just more on governance and staffing. So um again that board of directors composed of the member community representatives um and we have a number of committees of volunteers that provide oversight executive committee finance committee you know approving our budget um our board approves our rates that we charge to customers. Um we acrew reserve funds. So whereas a private company would charge a supply rate and include sort of a profit margin within that rate um perhaps not visible to the communities but within that there is some you know markup that is now under the purview of the communities. So the vast majority of our budget is you know the cost of electricity but there is an acrruel of a net margin or a profit margin so to speak on top of that. It's really capitalizing the community reserve and that's long-term risk management. You build up a reserve fund. You become a robust, you know, financial entity. You become a [clears throat] desirable counterparty to contract with solar developers to build new projects or to otherwise, you know, finance investments that are beneficial for the members. Um, and so let's see. And then on the staff side, so you know within the member governance, you have myself, I'm the, you know, executive director of the organization and we have a staff of nine soon to be a bit more. Um, we have power operations team that is actively responsible for managing our wholesale power purchasing. Um, we have a finance team, you know, cash flows, receivables, payables, um, our credit, um, accounting, other financial functions. We have a member services team that's really about overseeing a customer service vendor, a contact center, engagements with all our cities and towns, um, communications, websites, newsletters, events, things like that. We have a regulatory and legislative affairs team. Um, that's, you know, at the state house representing the interests of the members and at the public utility commission would be the department of public utilities in Massachusetts. and of course general counsel and then a number of contracted service providers as well um reporting to those staff those senior staff leaders. Um so again accountability and controlled by the uh cities and towns but then operated by a team of experts on behalf of um the community interests. Um so yeah this is sort of you know some of the points I've touched on but um you know this governance framework we find to have enormous potential for transformation. [clears throat] Um it can be very difficult for any individual community to you know significantly change a state's energy market but when acting in the collective together they uh there's sort of a an amplification of their voices and their power. Um so um and really we looked to California in a lot of ways. They have an interesting CCA market um where they're contracting for enormous amounts of renewable energy and developing battery projects and and innovating in other ways and we have some aspirations to um do more of that. I'll talk about some of the projects we've done but uh we are at the early stage just being a couple years into our operations. Um so mentioning the size of the membership again the state policy engagement um project development so I'll talk about one of the solar projects that we've constructed um and again putting the cities and towns in control of that significant capital flow associated with default energy service for all our communities. So I don't know exactly the population of some of your towns but I imagine you know 10,000 30,000 50,000 might not be probably have decent scale among yourselves and um you know there's one approach where you you know you strike the three-year contract with a broker or supplier and you can maybe come back and reset that contract at the end of that period of time but that one extra step of actually acrewing the the margin uh for the community benefit benefit. It really opens up a world of possibilities um is what we found. And again, we're so being, you know, sort of a corporate entity that we are, we have independent financial audits annually, um published to the membership. Um you know, we're very focused. There are there is it's a technical business. you know, energy portfolio risk management is um there's a lot of technical sort of back end that goes into that in managing how we buy energy in in sort of a volatile and difficult wholesale power market. Um so that does require you know significant expertise on a staff or contractor level. Um and that's part of our structure that we're we're continuing to build out. We started and we're reliant on thirdparty consultants uh and are now hiring more staff inhouse to assume those responsibilities more more closely. Um and then yeah just close by showing you a photo. This is our uh community solar project in Warner, New Hampshire. It's a 5 megawatt project. Um so you know you mentioned the project you're looking at. It might even be significantly larger than this it sounds like. And Massachusetts is well ahead of New Hampshire in terms of solar development in a lot of ways. But um this we think of this as sort of the tip of the iceberg. Our first you know real community solar project, the first of many hopefully to come and hoping to move towards you know solar plus storage more dispatchable resources that maximize our our portfolio value. you know, solar is really great. Uh, and we can lower cost for customers and the system as a whole better if we can pair that solar with batteries and say when we want it to flow back onto the grid um, when it's most valuable. So, that's sort of just an overview, but really I I wanted to think of this presentation as an introduction and a framing so that we could have more of a dialogue, a Q&A, just discussion around what it is that we do. Um, so yeah, I'll pause there. I appreciate being invited in and getting to meet you all. Great. Thank you so much, Henry. Um, yes, I was going to launch into questions. So, Ben's already got his hand up, so go ahead, Ben. >> It's all right, Stephanie. If you if you wanted to start, that's fine. >> That's fine. You go right ahead. >> In a sense, I just want to really clarify to make sure that like the model that you are and think about it in relationship to what we are. So, and I'm restating stuff that's dummy level, right? So, so right now all we do is like you said we get a a contract for uh energy at a price. First point energy is is is the one who does the wholesale interaction with the wholesale market and they make the profit. You know they they have to build in some profit into their estimates etc. They take the risk as well uh or at least they take that portion of risk. Um, my understanding of what you're talking about is that your company, for one of a better word, your joint powers entity is a company that would be is doing what First Point is doing for us. >> Yeah, that that's exactly right. So, we are, you know, we're not and you may have just gone directly to First Point. There may have been a broker that helped you strike that deal. We're not the broker. We are first point, but we are a nonprofit owned and controlled by the cities and towns we serve. So they see I have a direct view into how are we buying power? What's sort of the the cost revenue side of that? Where's the markup? But that's a perfect analogy. We are the supplier. We're just a nonprofit locally controlled transparent supplier. >> So that's really helpful. >> You had to build the capacity to do that. >> Yes. Um, and at least initially, right, you're just purchasing power on the wholesale market just like First Point, hoping that you can do it better. But it, at least initially, were you able to have a higher fraction of renewables in your in your portfolio than say the the, you know, the kind of the commercial competitors? And were you able to offer nonetheless the lowest rate? >> Yeah, that's a great question. So, for the first two years or so of service, we had the lowest rates in the state and had, you know, significant savings relative to the other providers. Um, and for the past year and a half or so, we've had a a slight premium to some of the utilities. And there's a number of reasons to that that I can get into. There were a couple of expensive winters. utilities actually have deferred some costs and are sort of operating at a loss and and waiting to recoup some of those costs. And there's a number of factors there. So, our rates have been better and worse in some instances. And then some of our towns choose a higher renewable energy default. Um Hanover, Durham, some of the other ones have done that. Not all of them do. We're not primarily um you know our mission is not necessarily 100% renewable energy but some of our towns we facilitate that for um >> so when you do that I'm sorry Bob I just want to like >> keep going get so when you do that you're okay we have certain towns that are getting higher renewable energy percentages that they've negotiated with you essentially right >> um are those real renewables or are those wrecks >> uh those are wrecks and they are New England wrecks. So they are local wrecks in lot New Hampshire, but they are not we haven't >> other than that uh one 5 megawatt project. That's the only new development we've constructed. We as we have aspirations to build a lot more renewables >> thus far the majority of our like renewable content is wreck content, >> right? So it's Rex participating in basically the same market that our wrecks are participating in. And as you probably know, at least right now, that wreck market is kind of broken from the perspective of actually driving new uh uh new development basically because of circumstances beyond our control. Yeah, I I feel somewhat similar in that, you know, one of the things that motivated me and motivates many of our members into this joint powers agency model is, you know, the set it, forget it, strike a deal for some contract that maybe has some more Rex in it that maybe you're from New England or maybe are national Rex, you know, is that really changing anything? And that was sort of the question we asked. And um then you ask, well, how do you build new renewables? And we found that this joint powers agency model was how we thought we could best do that. >> So this Warner uh solar development, the one you you showed us, that's your first one where as a contra essentially the the contractor that's that is supplying electricity to to these cities and towns. You've this is the first kind of uh generator you've built. >> That's right. using and the source of the funds for for building that generator. >> We have it's a power purchase agreement. We don't own the project. We have struck a power purchase agreement with a developer. They have financed it and used their third party capital to construct it to own it and we have a deal to buy the output and really tech you know technically it's a group net metering construct um which is a special set of circumstances but only through our existence and our being the offtaker so to speak >> right you're the off taker >> we're the off taker yeah >> um so two question I'm sorry Bob like I just want to call this so >> so you're the off taper taker of net metering credits which are dollars not kilowatt hours. >> That's right. >> So your customers, right, the the the CCA customers from all these different towns are getting some sort of dollar credit on their overall bill related to this project. the electricity price that they pay and the supply the electricity supply is actually not changed. Correct. >> That's correct. >> Okay. Um, so it's so it's a it's a PPA, but it's really not a PPA. It's actually essentially community solar. It's net metering. >> And what is the length of time that you entered into a contract to be the offtaker for all of those credits? Uh, and it's either 20 years or through 2040. Um, >> okay. But 20 a long time. In other words, like it's it's not it's it's a long long-term agreement. Um, one more question, Bob. My totally done. >> Keep going, man. >> So, if we wanted to do you one better, right? So if if I if I wanted um net metering credits right now, in fact, the city is being, you know, we are considering entering into one of these long-term agreements to basically uh pay uh 90 cents on the dollar uh for net metering credits used to be better. Now that's seems like about as well as we're going to do. Um and the city is one big offtaker. Obviously the act just the municipal operations but like the actual actual say VGE territory would be a much much larger offtaker. Um so you know we could do that and in a sense you wonder well what what do you actually need the CCA for? You just need a set a list and some schedule Z's to distribute or schedule Z is what we call it in Massachusetts where you distribute those credit dollar credit. >> Your group your group membership >> you just distribute it to the group. It's an email. It's a it's a mailing list. >> Yeah. >> Right. That the CCA isn't really playing a role because it's not producing power. If we wanted to do one better and say actually we want to be the like you are. You're a wholesale purchaser. We want to be the wholesale purchaser of the actual power off of say Warner like like like if it had been >> So I guess two questions in that one. Was that something you guys considered where you're the actual purchaser over some presumably long contract period and how would that have affected your rates versus how you ended up doing it and why? >> Yeah. So I'm just I'm thrilled by your level of understanding of all this and the um the question. It's because this is exactly the crux of like how do we design an effective marketplace and actually that's not net metering. Net metering is not an effective marketplace and we need to move beyond it. Um and so I'll try to answer your question. Essentially in this circumstance at the 1 to 5 megawatt scale group net metering is all we've got. Um and it's the most economical. Um, but for all the reasons you described, it's not actually a part of the portfolio. We're not actually supplying those kilowatt hours to all of our customers. We have this sort of convoluted group net metering administrative construct where uh there's a net metering credit and that's divvied up and cut checks to different members. And so that's like administrative top down. It's sort of like a central planning approach. We want to create a marketplace. You ask why wouldn't we do a wholesale contract? There's a threshold which is 5 megawatts. When you exceed 5 megawatts or greater than that, you have to register with ISO New England as a wholesale generator. We would like to contract with over 5 megawatt solar or storage or other ISO New England wholesale generators as part of our supply. We have not yet done that, but that's in the works. And then really our objective is to change the rules um for the sub 5 megawatt scale. We want to create what we call load reducers. Essentially, a local marketplace where instead of net metering, you can buy and sell energy um within New Hampshire. This avoids our ISO New England costs for energy, for capacity, and for transmission. >> And we want to be compensated for those values. So there's sort of this value of distributed energy resource uh there's this value there but the state >> so would you then as the wholesale purchaser essentially capture that value as part of your profit? >> Yes. Um, and then you're able to just be the wholesale purchaser of this smaller uh production from >> and the current rules and regulations don't allow us to do this and we have to change the rules and regulations. But um that would then offset or reduce our wholesale load obligation, the volume of power we have to buy at wholesale, the cost of capacity that we pay at wholesale, and the transmission cost for all of New Hampshire. Right now, we don't have exposure to those price signals, but we want to target monthly peak load reduction by dispatching solar plus storage locally beneath the ISO England level and then be compensated for the actual reduction in wholesale costs associated with our transmission load reduction essentially and that requires regulatory change. Would would you be the ones managing the battery, monitoring the markets and discharging and and charging? >> It could be us. We could pay a third party to do it. Um but yeah, essentially it would be us or will be us through a contract we strike with some provider. >> Okay. Um but so this is really getting at the crux of like the very technical challenges we're up against where we have designed an energy system with one set of rules and regs and that metering and market signals and utility control over data and metering and infrastructure and certain business systems and those things in order to actually create this marketplace where you know household like proumers transactive energy you have 5,000 batteries and 5,000 homes that are all dynamically responding ing to price signals and reducing load when it's valuable. And we all of our electric vehicles are now generating revenue for us because they charge in the nighttime when it's super cheap or they discharge power into the grid during high load times and the customers now all getting paid because if you have those 5,000 electric vehicles that's a power plant. You don't need the power plant anymore because you have a virtual power plant of customers. >> Yeah. So I sorry Bob but now he's bringing up this other thing which is so we don't have time of use rates >> do you? >> No and we have a partner we we are working with UNIL which is one of our smaller utilities who in a rate case settlement agreement to which we were a party and a collaborator they have agreed to do more data sharing towards time of use rates in partnership with us on a pilot basis. So we want to start doing that but ever source is so >> so the supply portion is getting time of use rates but the de the delivery side is not. >> Neither are getting time right now. >> So how are you how how are you making money from off- peak charging? >> No, we're uh we're I'm what I'm saying is the vision of the future. I'm not saying we right now are doing that. I'm saying the the clear and logical objective and evolution of the system is to have time of use rates and dispatchable local resources. We're going to build that future. It's in process. >> Okay, great. So, yeah. So, in that in that way, we're in the same same boat. Everyone's afraid of actually seeing real prices and I'm like, "Show me real prices," >> right? We're like, "Show us real prices." was like, "Please show us real prices or at least allow our customers the choice to be shown real prices." >> Yeah. >> All right. Sorry, Bob. >> No, don't apologize, Ben. That was really great. Glad you showed up. >> And almost all of it was way above my pay grade, so I'm glad you were you were taking it on there, Ben. Um my my questions, Henry, are a little bit more about structural um organizational structural aspects of this. So here we are um Valley Green Energy, three communities um you know um and there are many other aggregators, community aggregators throughout Massachusetts um but you know most of us don't talk to one another. Um so I'm I'm wondering from a structural perspective in terms of your organization were was your um joint powers um agency created by a collaboration of a whole bunch of aggregated uh aggregators through in communities throughout New Hampshire. >> Uh no but sort of. So, we got our legislation enacted in 2021 or in 2019 and then there was sort of a legislative fight you could call it and we updated it in 2021. Um and um so we we were authorized under legislation in 2021 and simultaneous to this I worked with my role just my background is I work for clean energy New Hampshire which was a nonprofit sort of trade association you know worked on policy for the solar companies and also had a membership of cities and towns. So my job was there are 70 local energy committees in New Hampshire. My job was to run their newsletter and help them write their RFPs for solar projects and run their conference and network them with grants and resources. And through that building of those relationships and then the enacting of our community power law formed a work group of initially four of those cities and towns to say how do we want to implement community power and then that grew to the initial 14 founding members that we you know we drafted our corporate charter or joint powers agreement and um each town adopts that contract and becomes a member to the organization. We did all of this before there was any aggregation operational in the state. So the first launch of any aggregation was CPC&H launching 10 towns under a joint powers agency model. There had never been been anything before 20 April 2023. So in other words, you you did it we're doing it the opposite way, I guess you could say, because the the aggregations of of different within different communities or of different communities exist, but the big umbrella now there may be some joint power agencies in Massachusetts. I just don't know. But the big umbrella, which is what you are, is the way I see it, [clears throat] um doesn't exist here. And it it also leads me to um wonder [clears throat] about scale because we have talked about the creation of a joint power um agency um but you know looking at our our three towns so you know we're looking at Northampton I don't know about 30,000 people Amoris at about 40,000 people pel at about 1,400 people um you know so this is tiny this is really small stuff. >> I mean, it's not it's enough. I mean, our first well, we had Nasha, which was 80,000 people in the first launch, but together I mean, you're almost at, you know, I don't know, you're not too far off from 100,000 people, which is sufficient scale, and you could Massachusetts is a much bigger market than >> Okay. And then so one other comment I just have to say this before I forget but if you take away one thing from this conversation it should be that you should meet with Samuel Golding who lives in Amherst at um he's at the Cherry Hill co-housing community um and he was one of the co-founders of CBC&H and it is because of his deep knowledge about joint powers agency and power markets that we were able to do everything that we did. Um he you know he's there in the beginning and you know we had a great network of communities and local energy knowledge and he had a California perspective of here is how to establish a joint powers agency. Write your contracts. Write your business plan. negotiate for millions of dollars in credit support and hire, you know, a market participant with ISO of New England and a portfolio manager and and put put sort of the business side of this together and he's right there with you all. So, you you really have to meet with Samuel Holding and I'm happy to introduce you. >> Great. >> That's great, Henry. Thank you so much. Um, Bob, if I could jump in because I think the challenge and I was going to ask you about developing a business plan because that's something where we're sort of we sort of hit a bit of a wall with with that. Um, we definitely have a need to do so obviously. So, um, you know, this is great. Contacting someone like him would be really enormously helpful because I think we um started to draft an RFP. uh we have one that's drafted. Um but it would be great to have somebody like him look at it and give us input and feedback and then to maybe proceed with next steps. So that's such a great Thank you so much for that. That's >> I mean the there is um we sort of had a trifecta of I I had this relationships with all many cities and towns. We had somebody on our team, Clifton Bo, who uh spent six years in the legisl or six years in the house, six years as a senator and six years as a public utility commissioner and was now a city councelor in in Lebanon. Um who understood the legislative and regulatory framework better than anyone. And then Samuel Goldie understands sort of the business perspective. And so yeah, he'd be really valuable to connect with him. And um you do to you know I I may have glossed over the arduous process and pathway that was establishing a joint powers agency. It is no small order to do. >> Yeah. How long did that take? Just out of curiosity. >> We started in 2020. So was 2020 um was sort of organizing and 2021 was legislation and in incorporating and then 2022 was startup. So it was at least I would say at least three years uh yet organizing the communities writing the corporate charter the JPA um getting a critical mass of talents to buy in and say we're going to put in the time and sit on the board and do the work to oversee this um and then having the right you know it for us it was myself and Samuel were the two professional consultants who did you know did the work and then we hired a general counsel a lawyer to help us write the uh JPA. Um, and then Samuel wrote the RFP to hire what was ultimately Calpine, Ascend Analytics, uh, and a couple of other contracted service providers to sort of run the business side, the customer service, the power procurement. Um, and so I'd say three years, but you all have an existing market and you're all very well educated already about what aggregation is. So it could be much a lighter lift. And if you have a critical mass of your three or four towns and if there are a couple, we had this concentric circle model. We said we're going to start with four communities to do the heavy lifting of drafting this thing. But we know there's a network of another dozen to two dozen that are kind of on the outside looking in. We'll have a a webinar for them every six months or a big summit once a year and get them interested and then we'll kind of grow from the four to the 12 and and from there on out. Those are just some thoughts. So, I just have a follow-up question and then I'll hand it over to Bob and then you, Ben. Um, so I think what I'm sort of unclear about is like in terms of when you started that staffing of getting this going, like how did you fund that initially? >> So, we had a pretty small grant from our community development finance authority that paid myself and Mr. building not all that much. And then we wrote a RFP that was a um for services and credit support under an at risk structure and it said if you're willing to uh provide our ISO New England market services and our portfolio management and help launch us and finish up our business plan at no cost upfront. then you will be repaid after we launch and we get revenue and cash flow over a 3-year period. And we did this in such a way where Kalpine and Desend and other firms agreed to essentially um contribute to launching the organization at no upfront cost at their own risk under an understanding that once we had revenue flows they would recoup their investments from that. And because of our scale, you know, we launched maybe initial 50,000 customers. We had a business plan that said we're going to grow about a h 100red million a year in revenue. Um that was justified. We're we're now 180 million in or 170 million in annual revenue. So there's a the yeah the business plan makes sense if you have the technical folks on your side to convey to the service providers like we're serious, we're real, we have a we can make this happen. >> Yep. And just one last question. Um, the grant funding, what was your initial grant funding that you had to la to pay you and Sam? >> I think it was like $75,000. >> Okay. Thanks. All right. Uh, Bob, >> so one of my I want to test this out. One of my takeaways from this um discussion um is that frankly I believe we're too small. Um you said, "Oh, no, no, you aren't. We're about 72,000 people in our catchment or our or service area of the three towns." Um, and it seems to me that the um um that what all of what you're describing, what you have described, which is incredible work, and by the way, my hats off to you. What a what a great uh great thing you've done. Um, but but all of that incredible work, it seems to me in our case anyway, I feel like it needs a bigger base. And I don't know whether that bigger base is simply seeing if there are some surrounding towns most of which are relatively small um that are who want to come into the aggregation. I don't even know how that works frankly structurally and and legally. Um but but also the other thought that I have is well there are other um CCAs like us and maybe the better strategy is to reach out to those and see if there's a way that we can come together um and do something and and there are some CCAs of some of course this you go eastern Massachusetts big big um you know so I I don't know but my takeaway and this is what I wanted to really ask you Henry My takeaway is it it just feels like we need um um a greater um numbers um in order to really make this thing go and and you know to attract for example a grant like the one that you got as a startup kind of thing and so on as opposed to our three relatively well modestsiz communities. It strikes me that among yourselves, you have the right anchor of dedicated people who can see this through and then maybe you're right that if you can start to lay tracks with who's the the early adopters after you, who's like in waiting in the wings to after you've maybe done some of the upfront lifting can can come along in and help the scale. That's not a bad idea. >> I guess what I wanted to do was share some of that heavy lifting beyond beyond just the three communities that are here. But anyway, I'll let Ben go now. >> Yeah, I just just to follow up, sorry, really quickly on what Bob is saying. I think the challenge for us is that, you know, >> at least Ben and I, you know, have jobs beyond just working with this. Like we can't devote 100% of our time just to working on this, right? >> And it's like the getting it going really does require a lot of time. I've been the staff leazison um since the beginning. Well, not from the very beginning, but for quite a while now. and it's um it does require a lot when we're developing RFPs and that kind of thing. So um just you know I think that's the concern um that we have is that we don't necessarily have the time. >> Yeah, that's legitimate concern. >> Okay. Go ahead. >> So So where both of you are coming from is I think where I where I'm coming to next which is when I hear what you're describing and it goes back to my first question. So you guys are basically just first point but maybe nicer, you know, um, and you know, with more governance. Um, but from the perspective of any of these individual cities or CCAs, you're just the low bidder or the best bidder, you know, the one who who who gets the the contract. And so the question I just to be kind of like uh contrary is like is a joint powers agency necessary? Could one find a just a purely private sector company or put together some entity that either already does this wants or wants to to do it to break in to start offering uh you know so let's say you are a company that what you're going to do is manage virtual power plant you're just going to be tweaking people's thermostats and and EV chargers and you know like that kind of stuff. And if that was your investment and maybe it's solar and batteries, whatever it was, you make these these investments. You're that that company and it you're just going to say, well, I'm going to bid that this is the power and this is the sources and here's the price. And if it should if it should work for a joint powers entity, why shouldn't it work for just another entity? I think it's a fair question and um I in New Hampshire I think the answer is no because I think um essentially it's a question of leadership and who is going to lead the next hundred years of energy markets and development and we look around and we see our state and our regulators and our department of energy and our investor own utilities none of them are going to lead it. it's not happening and you have a different landscape maybe in Massachusetts and your legislative framework and you're pro- clean energy ethos is stronger let's say than ours uh so maybe you don't have the same challenges maybe you have the the framework that's needed we looked around and said there's all this leadership at the municipal level we see the ways the system is uh I don't know if dysfunctional is the right word but is suboptimal let's say and how it could be better and some some we need a institution that is equipped to to shape and lead that at a really an institutional state level. And that's I think the vision that you get you can get with the joint powers agency is now it's not just well whatever the sort of legacy incumbent 100-year-old utility company says. Now there's a new institution that's a totally new form of public power and through that vehicle we really can start to shape like a long-term planning for the state the state energy market. Uh so that that's our perspective but I think you make a fair point like is all the trouble and the governance and the time worth it? Um one of the things I love about New New Hampshire and really knowing that I'm from Lexington, Massachusetts actually. Um, you know, the there's so much dedication to public service, folks serving on their select boards, local communities, their committees. Um, and so, you know, we're just an evolution of that. We're just sort of the next way in which that local control public service is kind of manifested. >> Yeah. No, I I think that's relevant and and I and I wouldn't say that we have this fully highly functioning um utility regulatory system here. Um yeah, no, that's that's that's that's well taken. Um and and if I just add, so I think our next chapter, we've sort of like, you know, we've launched, we've scaled, we've stabilized, we've hired key professional staff. Our next chapter is sort of a pivot back to the external world into partnerships and to say okay how do we work with the utility companies with the you know the organizations in the state that shape state policy how do we become partners and expand our sort of external coalition work with them >> um which is going to be really key because again we can't do this in a vacuum then you have to be the then you have to actually play nice to some degree with with all the other stakeholders to to move things. Oh, yeah. This was another question. I think it's Conway, New Hampshire. I could be wrong with that. That is their own municipal like they they had a pre-existing municipal light plant. >> Not Conway, but Wolfboro, Littleton, a couple of others. >> Yeah. Some places that had like, you know, legacy dams that were doing hydropower. >> Um I can't remember her name. There was a sustainability person from one of these cities who kind of like >> You all have MW. Do you know Emwick? >> Yes. >> Yeah. >> So, so are any of these municipal uh utilities also participating in your power purchasing entity? No. >> No. They they do their own thing, but it the idea hasn't been floated of would be worth a conversation to see if there's some mutual benefit in scale in joint procurement. We haven't done that, but we also have a co-op. We have a New Hampshire electric co-op, which is maybe 10% of the state, >> right? Yeah. >> That, you know, is cooperatively owned. >> So, can I ask a question, Stephanie? >> Yeah, go ahead. Um, so when I think about your organization, Henry, and all of the staff and the subcontractors that you have, I mean, obviously there's, you know, a fairly substantial budget involved there, I would imagine, um, in order to run to to run your organization. Um, and what I'm wondering is how does that affect the rates that are charged to customers? Um, and in fact, I you know, why not why not ask what what are what are you what are the rates right now for electricity per kilowatt hour to your customers? And I know we can't compare New Hampshire and Massachusetts apples to apples on that, but it would just be curious to know. >> Yeah. So, I'll just I have this up and uh is that showing that work chart? >> Not yet. >> Oh, there we go. >> Notice. >> Yeah. So, this is this is our work chart. So, yes, our operating budget is about um $8 million. Um and that's, you know, staff, myself, four department leads, uh a number of staff here, um you know, accounting, contracting, portfolio manager, market participant, customer service, IT functions, lobbyist, regulatory council. So, um, and then, you know, financing, office space, some of the overhead costs, things like that. >> Um, I don't know, external auditor, general counsel. So, that's what it looks like. Uh, it's in in terms of rate impact, that's small. That's um less than half a cent kilowatt hour, closer probably to 0.25 cents a kilowatt hour, I think. Um, and the overall rate right now we charge uh 14.9 cents for Eversource residential customers and Eversource charges I think 14.1 cents. So Eversource is slightly lower a little less than a cent lower a little yeah than us. Um so if that answers your question >> and but Henry um in and what in terms of what you're buying you know we we have a reg we have regulatory market here which requires that the suppliers have a certain percentage of renewables in the basic rate. >> Um I don't know whether New Hampshire has a requirement. >> I forget what the percentage is right now of renewables that are required. Bener Stephanie you probably know. >> Not at the top of my head. Well, anyway, it's a, you know, some amount that is there and it's and it increases each year and there was legislation, I don't know if you you all saw this, that seems to be on its way to passing that eliminates the biomass, which is great. So, that will no longer be able to be counted um in that percentage uh which is going to make the market go a little haywire, I think, uh for a while. But Henry, I don't know whether in in New Hampshire your 14.9 cent rate um is is u um what percentage of renewables is built into that I guess is what I'm wondering. >> Uh that is reflective of the minimum requirement renewables which is 25%. >> Okay. And then we offer you know uh granite plus 10% or more clean 50 clean 100 >> and some towns take a higher level as a default >> which so and just to add to this so there is there's an operating expense in the rate that is relatively small and there is a reserve adder and that's what would be a profit margin for a private company and that is a part of our premium at least right now although we have we expect that we're trending towards sort of more parody with the utilities. Um but we we do have to meet a target and build up our cash reserves over a 3 to 5 year period. And in doing that will create a lot of future rate relief. And there is a we're on a runway to that. And there is a tension between making the joint powers agency financially robust and going to be around for decades and have a credit rating and short-term lowest cost power. and our members, some of our members are feeling that right now and we're getting pressured to lower rates. Um, so that's just a dynamic that is we're experiencing >> and and you know, just hearing that, Henry, first of all, very helpful. Thank you. Um, and seeing you know, the the what the organization looks like and what its budget needs to be and so on. Um, reinforces my thinking that we need a bigger we need a bigger base. I mean, you're dealing with a a much larger population that you're serving. Um and so if anyway it just reinforces my thinking about that. >> Thank you. >> Y >> yeah the organizational piece is huge. >> Have you all done the math on what is what's the annual revenue of your combined town's power supply? >> Yeah it's roughly right now um >> oh I'm sorry not the revenue >> probably 50 to$100 million. Yeah, I don't think we've actually looked at the revenue. >> Yeah, I haven't looked at that. The the whatever we call it the the the the little bit we we save >> the adder that we have >> the adder is is one mil. >> Yeah. And we got we make like 125ish. >> Yeah. >> But if you have 50,000 people and they each spend how much money does a household spend a month? >> We actually have se we actually have 72,000 people. But anyway, go ahead. I don't know. This is going to be really bad math. Um 100 times 12. I mean, if they each spend a hundred bucks a month on electricity times 12 months, that's $86 million. But if you're if you have 72,000 in population, really, you have half as many electric accounts. >> Y divide that by two and you get 36,000 accounts times 100 bucks a month, which is low, times 12, and that's 43 million. So, I mean, you're talking an annual revenue of 50 to 100 million. Um, and you could support a $4 million operating budget out of that with limited rate impact. So, this is the business plan that you show the service provider. They say, and again, that's I think a big shift in the mindset when you're just signing a contract. You don't quite realize like there's a lot of money on the other side of these deals with suppliers. >> Yeah. >> Well, I think the business plan development is obviously, you know, >> Yeah. an enormous need. So, um, Henry, thank you so much. I know you've given us an hour of your time. I mean, we have another half hour of our meeting, but certainly if you need to go, um, >> I do have to go. Thank you. >> I really enjoyed the conversation. I'd be happy to chat with you again. I'll send you Sand Gold's contact information and maybe I don't maybe always meet virtually, but it could be worth meeting him in person. He's just he's quite uh he's I think one of the national experts in this space. So, >> well, I'm definitely going to reach out to him and try to invite him to our to a meeting. So, thank you so much. Really, really appreciate it. >> Yeah. Until next time. Yeah. Thanks so much, Henry. Really. >> Thanks so much. Bye. >> Take care, Henry. Thank you. >> All right. That was inspiring and sobering all at the same time. >> Exactly. [laughter] That's a good way to put it. Stephen, >> you know. Um, yeah. I I think, you know, I'm I'm so excited to know about Samuel, though, and I think that's great. Um, so it's funny. I wish I had known that. Um, like a year ago I had gone to do a presentation at Cherry Hill. They just invited me and the health director to just go speak to people about what we do and have a conversation. So, um, I'm not even sure he may have been there and I didn't even know. So, um, okay. So, um, I'm going to move along in our agenda. Uh, is there any any followup? I mean, I think the follow-up for me is like, let's try to get >> invite Sam Golding in. >> That's the takeaway I'm coming with. So, what about anybody else? Was there anything else that any thoughts people had before we move on? >> I mean, I like Bob, I just see the whole thing as extraordinarily daunting. Um, and so the thing I'm kind of interested in is basically can get somebody else to do it. And um uh it's possible that someone like Power Options has the like the legislation that they operate under for cities might cover procurement of a of energy services for an aggregation and especially if we could bring in aggregations from other places to give them a big market. if they might be the type of entity that could basically pull together this the equivalent function without us having to do it ourselves. >> Yeah, I think us having to do it ourselves. I I just I think it's to me it feels very much like bringing in Mass Power Choice, right? Because all of the details, all of the work that they do behind the scenes, like they do so much, you know, we wouldn't have I know that initially when we launched we were going to try to do this on our own. I don't think we would have really been able to. I think the knowledge that they bring and the facility that they bring to making it happen was enormous. So I see this as like a you know again same I see us needing to have another outside entity help us with this. Adele you have your hand up. I was wondering uh what you meant, Ben, by um we have to create First Light. >> Oh, just that I just meant like First Light is is the company that sells us our power, right? They do all the wholesale contracting. They're the ones who go out there and find the power and make the deals. what his joint powers entity does is exactly the same thing. >> Okay, >> they created a new company that does that job but has different governance structure >> and maybe some different values. >> Okay. And and one one other takeaway that I would add, Stephanie, first of all, I think you're absolutely right that um getting this person to, you know, talk to us, but I think I'm going to keep pushing for we got to be bigger. Um and I'd like and I'd like to test that with him. >> Yeah. >> Um you know, and I really want to have that conversation with him. I think we have to be bigger and it would be great if we could pull together other CCAs um and and and share a vision and all get excited together u because I think that that kind of um um those numbers will really make this more of a reality. I'm sorry. Go ahead. Yeah. >> Yeah. Can I Darcy before I just want to follow up quickly on what Bob just said? I think having the conversation with Sam will be enormously helpful to to that degree. And I think if we have something that's more that we have more I think the business plan is super important, but I think if we have something that's a little more solidified, it would be easier to bring other CCAs in. And I feel like that's also where my connection to the New England Municipal Sustainability Network could really be advantageous because there are now there's I think we have over 100 communities now that are involved. It's really grown. So um go ahead Darcy. Yeah, I guess I just stem coming from our history of of kind of assuming that we were going to scale up at at the outset and and deciding that just to start we would start with these three communities. But there was always the assumption that we would scale up and that would be the only way that we could really bring in the kind of revenue that would enable us to do some of these projects. Um, and that's why we wrote the JPA uh and because that that was going to enable new members to join. And so we went through a whole lot of, you know, how are we going to uh do the voting? You know, do big population cities have a different vote? Is it a weighted vote? And anyway, I'm just saying a lot has gone into this discussion of scaling up over the years. Um, and that's always been my assumption is that we would have to scale up I don't think there's any disagreement there. [laughter] I think we all know that. I think we agree with you. Um, any any other comments before we move on. Okay. Um, Darcy and Adele, thank you so much for bringing Henry to our attention and making the connection. I think it's great. Um I and I love that he's a UNH Sustainability Institute fellow graduate. That's that just reinforces to me the reason why I keep going to that program for getting the fellows to do the work we happen to do. Our current fellow has been amazing. So um it's been Yeah, it's great. Nice connection. So um okay, moving on. Uh the next agenda item is Valley Green Energy Updates. I don't really have anything uh at the moment, so nothing to report on. Um and the next agenda item after that is local energy advocate updates. Do you all have any updates for the group or announcements? >> Well, just that Adele and I attended the Northampton Energy Committee meeting yesterday, which we which I was very impressed with. Thank you, Ben. But uh and one of the agenda items was how Valley Green Energy, you know, what what projects Valley Green Energy might engage in. And that was uh of of uh of a lot of interest to I think both Adele and me. And so I'm I'm really happy that um you're getting the community involved in that. and also that there's so many um knowledgeable people on your committee. Uh that's super exciting that they were able to all understand what each other was saying. [laughter] I can't I cannot say that I understood a lot of it but um but yeah so new ideas which uh are exciting. Can can I add to that just because I would say the big takeaway from that discussion was oh well we need to put onto our agenda for the next time a recommendation or not like you know to decide to make a recommendation to enable us to vote to allow Valley Green Energy to engage in very long-term contracts. Right. So, right now we're doing these two-year, three-year contracts. If we want to do direct power purchase agreements, which we could do, right? And we could put that into the mix. We could say like first point just to to keep picking on them, you know, in the RFP, you have to include the things that we've already agreed to as part of our PPA and and build from there. and that's just part of your your mix, you know, like that would be plausible, but it can only happen if you're doing 20-year contracts. And for a city to enter into a 20-year contract is something. >> Yeah. You're not going to get Amoris's town manager to come into that. >> Yeah. >> Length. Not at this time, you know. >> Yeah. So that that's why I bring it up is is to like >> that's really the only path, >> right, for any of these things where there's no fuel, there's no, you know, the ongoing costs are low. It's just that you need to to have a long-term contract so that the capitalist who's, you know, some whoever's providing the capital for the project has the revenue stream at a at a rate that they can accept. Um, and so any of these agreements are all like 15 to 20 year to 25 year agreements. >> Well, again, when this thing gets sort of more flushed out and has a more solidified path forward, >> yeah, >> that might be the time once that's complete. I mean, I think the business plan is just absolutely key, necessary. >> Well, I'm saying this is separate that this is >> I hear you, but I'm saying but I'm saying for to make that level of commitment. I mean, I know you're talking about when we're sort of >> at a point where we might be investing in producing energy, you'd have to and to become that, you'd have to have the longer term contract. >> Yeah. But I'm just saying that to make that level of commitment, we'd have to have more of a solid substantial piece to um justify that level of commitment. Like something that's more solid behind why we're we're doing this. >> Oh, sure. Right. But that so just hypothetically speaking, right? you've got a a project, you say, "We're going to engage in this long-term contract and we've basically fixed our price for 20 years, right? And it's almost guaranteed to be lower than anything else, right? So, and solar is just that is the way it's it's looking. But there's that second question of like, but can you agree to anything for 20 years?" you know, so it would be possible to make something solid like that's just an RFP and you have somebody present something that's solid and fun financed >> but it's getting what's that >> interrupt because I have a 215 >> Adele. Thanks Adele. >> Did you want to say something Adele? Okay. Um I I just want to make sure I understand what we were just talking about. >> Um and I want to translate it to again the potential project that is happening here. >> Yeah. >> Tell them. So, if I understood what you were saying, Ben, um you know, the question is, is Valley Green Energy positioned in our current iteration to enter into a contract with this company uh that is creating this and say, "We'll we'll enter to a 20-year contract to purchase power from you." Is that what we're talking about here? >> Yes. >> Okay, got it. >> It's that simple, right? They say, "Here's our perspectus. Here's what we're going to make. Here's the rate. You're you're you've got a locked in rate for 20 years. >> Okay. >> Will you take it? And can we, you know, so can we do that? And can can we have a city or three communities all authorize Valley Green Energy to enter into that kind of a contract?" >> Yeah. Okay. Got it. Got it. And and one more followup on that. So, so let's assume that this pro just use this project. I I forget what it's going to be. Um it's going to be 30 acres of of solar. It's huge. >> It's big. >> Um I think I've got that right. Anyway, um let's assume for the moment that we want to do this and um the amount of energy that it will produce does not equal what we need, >> right? That means Valley Green Energy then enters into multiple contracts like one contract with them and another contract with somebody else. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Okay. Okay. >> And those those other ones could be shorter term contracts essentially driven by the cost of fossil fuels. >> But we could structure our RFP to First Point or whoever it is to say you're just making up the difference. >> Yeah. And you have to bill for everything. >> Yeah. Okay. It's becoming a little clearer in this buddy here. >> Okay. >> Well, great. Um Okay. Um next agenda item is topics not anticipated. I don't think we have anything. Um >> yeah. Um [laughter] uh so for the next meeting agenda, I think we could I could reach out and see if we can get Sam to the next meeting. >> Yeah. >> Um just to sort of talk to him in general about what we're doing. Um that next meeting is September 17th. >> Yes. >> So I will take it upon myself to track him down. Um and if we don't get him, I don't know. will have just the usual standing items unless somebody has if something comes up just shoot me an email and let me know you have an agenda item and I'll add it. Um there is no public for public comment. So we could have a motion to adjurnn. >> So move second. >> All right. And I'm also Yes. So thank you all so much. This was a great great meeting. Great interesting information. >> Yeah. Thanks a lot everybody. >> All right. Thanks everybody. Bye.