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Mayor Jackson fights back to move forward on LED street light replacement
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Mayor Jackson’s Sustainability Chief Andrew Watterson doesn’t understand why GE is crying foul about the deal to bring Chinese Light Emitting Diode (LED) manufacturer Sunpu-Opto and 350 jobs to Cleveland.
“It’s a lot like the U.S. automakers’ response to the Japanese coming on to their turf in the 1970s and 80s,” Watterson observes. “GE made the first LED bulb in 1962, and they used it in calculators and in outer space. Six months ago, we spoke to GE about this and they thought LEDs are only for specialty products like signs. They didn’t see them as part of their main line lighting products for another three to five years. I met with them a month ago, and their tune was different. They told me they could make what we’re looking for.”
GE’s presence alone in East Cleveland and Cleveland doesn’t translate to what the city wants to do today: Use its purchasing power to attract jobs while reducing its carbon footprint, Watterson says. He compares the city’s role to the Cleveland Foundation’s who helped create the nationally recognized Evergreen Cooperatives, offering residents a start up business like the Evergreen Laundry by cementing deals for contracts from big University Circle institutions.
“At the 2019 summit, the mayor talked about the need to take bold steps. This is demonstrating how. I never thought we would get Cleveland Public Power to change all its street lights in this short a period of time (3-5 years). It will improve their operations tremendously.”
GE is fighting the deal, taking out full page ads in the Plain Dealer and, Watterson anticipates, an editorial in the Sunday PD that mirrors the advertised message that the city is wasting its money.
In a letter to the mayor, GE Lighting President and CEO Michael Petras, Jr. writes that “the reason you do not see installations of tubular LEDs (other than for R&D purposes or product trials) is because they are still novelties and experimental. State-of-the-art fluorescent products are very long-lasting, proven products that offer extremely high efficiency – and cost only a small fraction of what LEDs would cost in this type of application.”
GE argues that the city could spend less money and still get more efficient fluorescent tubes at City Hall and see a reduction in its energy use.
“GE will say, “our fluorescent tubes also have a 40,000 hour life expectancy, but fluorescent tubes are allowed to have a 50% failure rate and dim more (than LEDs). Most people don’t utilize their warranty because they can’t prove which bulbs are covered,” Watterson says.
The city plans to replace the fluorescent tubes in its buildings, starting with City Hall, and for its utility company, CPP, to replace all 67,000 street lights. GE doesn’t manufacture LED street lights, and Watterson says the company told him they don’t plan to make them any time soon. The street light replacement would save 50 million Kilowatt/hours and reduce CO2 emissions by 25,282 tons annually. CPP would have to test the new LED lamp and set the rate with FirstEnergy before estimating its cost savings (CPP pays $12 million annually for its street light bill).
If they replaced all of the bulbs at City Hall with LEDs, Watterson says, the savings during a ten-year warranted period is an estimated $552,000, which translates into a three-year return on investment. The advantage that Sunpu Opto offers translates to: years of manufacturing LEDs, their competitive prices and a design for a straight swap of City Hall’s existing T12 fluorescent bulb for an LED T12 without changing the ballast, the mechanical part of a light fixture, Watterson adds.
The hold up is Cleveland City Council, where some members have balked at the city’s no-bid contract. City Council will take up the issue again on May 17 at 2 p.m. at its Finance Committee. Watterson is trying to address fears that the city is locked into something it cannot adjust later—the contract has guarantees of performance and low cost matching.
Meanwhile, Watterson is trying to spread the word to sustainability advocates, including his 2019 email list, that “LED lighting is the lighting choice of the future and it is important that we move aggressively forward towards a path that will position Cleveland and our region to take full advantage of this new technology.”
Sunpo Opto is prepared to move its manufacturing facility to the U.S. and was attracted by Cleveland’s lighting cluster, including GE, which buys LED parts from suppliers like Sunpo Opto. “I see it being able to spur innovation for GE. Sunpu is primarily a parts O&M supplier.”
Watterson sees only upside to the deal. Cleveland is attracting a company that is planning on spending an initial $1 million to renovate an existing building in the city and is not taking any tax breaks.
“The mayor said, to make progress we’re going to have to move quickly and it’s going to piss people off, but we have to do business differently.” Or as he writes in his email: We have outlined a path forward that will benefit the City of Cleveland’s economy, reduce its expenditures on electricity and reduce our carbon footprint by aggressively moving forward with an LED lighting program. We are doing this by utilizing the City’s purchasing power to push innovation towards the future.
The city has posted the following documents on the Sunpu Opto deal and LEDs:
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Mayor Jackson kills Sunpu-Opto deal, says city will start fresh
Marc Lefkowitz Says:In the end, the system worked as intended, with city council acting as watchdog. Brian Cummins' comments address real concerns, and the mayor admits there are legitimate flaws in a deal that, at first blush, was bold.
If there's a silver lining in the end of the Sunpo-Opto no-bid deal to replace all Cleveland street lights and lights at City Hall with LEDs, it would be that the mayor hasn't lost his vision for creating a sustainable economy.
As reported in Cleveland.com: "Jackson said...his intentions have not changed, and that he will meet with staff members today to begin the process anew and seek proposals from any company that could meet the city's needs. He said he still intends to tie the city's purchasing power to its economic development goals, which in this case means buying millions of dollars in high-tech LED lights from a company willing to build a manufacturing plant here and create jobs."
Let's also consider how much this controversial deal has raised awareness of the city's plan to both address its ongoing budget concerns and act as catalyst for its Sustainable Cleveland 2019 agenda. Arguably, this did more to bring to light for Clevelanders that their city is willing to address its energy costs and that it takes its green economic agenda seriously.
Cleveland’s LED lighting plan – BOLD…but SENSIBLE?
BrianCummins Says:I agree with the Mayor's intent of attracting jobs, jobs that we would hope would be advance technology and sustainably driven but there is one glaring problem -- a lack of credibility.
There has been no credibility established for Sunpu Opto, their products or their representative, Peter Tien (of Princeton Environmental). For my full arguments and those of Ed Morrison, see the postings at the links below.
http://www.brewedfreshdaily.com/2010/cleveland’s-led-lighting-plan-bold-but-sensible
http://www.brewedfreshdaily.com/2010/clevelands-led-misguided-led-strategy
http://www.brewedfreshdaily.com/2010/clevelands-led-deal-gets-goofier-by-the-day
As Councilman Jay Westbrook has stated in his opposition to the contract, Cleveland City Council should not have had to do such arduous research to confirm the credibility - or lack thereof - of this deal.
The process by which the contract has been brought to Council and Council's leadership's handling of the legislation -- trying to push it through the Finance Committee with no other Committee's hearing it was unacceptable from the start.
Add to this no substantial amount of information or source documents that would show how Cleveland Public Power and the Administration has drawn their conclusions regarding the credibility of the company or claims of their products.
Add to this the U. S. industry's experts opinions that the jobs being promised are "phantom jobs" and that it is not wise or prudent to do such a long term contract for unproven products and a technology that is rapidly evolving -- see my post at the first link above and read about the DOE's Solid State Street Light Consortium which was seated this month and is being led by Edward Smalley of Seattle's City Light.
I want as much as anyone to attract advance technology jobs in sustainable product/practice industries, but this is no way to go about it. It is unfortunate that this issue and the way it has been handle is calling to question even the Administration's credibility at this point. I believe Mayor Jackson wants to do the right thing. I give him lots of credit for delegating responsibilities to his Chiefs, Directors and Commissioners, but in this case the Administration's team has not done sufficient due diligence and vetting of this deal.
This is evident from my conversations with highly respected people working within the LED industry.
We need to take pause, discuss the issues at hand seriously without rushing to a vote with such a slim potential margin of support.
We should be listening to this within the industry that are advising against this contract and approach.
Councilman Brancatelli has asked for a full-committee process taking back to the Utilities and Community & Economic Development Committees. I would support this in principal but I will not be supporting any 10-year contract with any company for the array of products that are in this agreement.
UPDATE 5/24/2010: see post with image of Brancatelli's memo from May 20th calling for more in depth Committee review within Council.
http://www.brewedfreshdaily.com/2010/may-20th-memo-from-a-brancatelli-to-council-pres-m-sweeney-re-sunpu-opto
Sincerely,
Brian Cummins
Cleveland City Councilman, Ward 14
bcummins[at]clevelandcitycouncil.org
216-664-4238
Employing energy efficiency is a must for Cleveland
Stefanie Spear Says:We don’t have to look far to understand the importance of transitioning U.S. energy generation to cleaner, renewable sources of power. More than 126 million gallons (or more than 11 times the total leaked from the Exxon Valdez disaster in 1989) of oil has so far spewed into the Gulf of Mexico from a BP-created oil rig disaster, and reached marshlands and shorelines along the gulf coast with 11 oil rig workers dead. In West Virginia, 25 coal miners died after a huge explosion at a Massey Energy mine in April. The human, environmental and economic impact of the current forms of energy is devastating communities, livelihoods, the environment and economy.
All this means we can’t underestimate the importance of energy efficiency at a time of transitioning to cleaner sources of fuel. Energy efficiency and renewable energy are the twin pillars of sustainable energy policy. Both resources must be developed aggressively if we are to reduce carbon dioxide and rely on safer forms of power. Efficiency is essential to slowing the energy demand growth so that rising clean energy supplies can make deep cuts in fossil fuel use.
The proposed contract to bring a Chinese Light Emitting Diode (LED) manufacturer, Sunpu-Opto, to Cleveland that would create 350 local jobs, renovate a vacant building and spur Cleveland’s commitment to energy efficiency is extremely exciting. Finally a great plan to reduce the cities carbon footprint, create jobs and protect human health all of which embarrasses the true sense of sustainability—people, planet, profits.
One of the potential energy efficiency projects that will come from this deal is the replacement of bulbs on all 67,000 street lights in the City of Cleveland that Cleveland Public Power (CPP) currently pays $12 million annually to power. The street light replacement to LEDs would save 50 million Kilowatt/hours, reduce CO2 emissions by 25,282 tons annually and reduce the cost to power these lights.
I commend Mayor Frank Jackson’s ability to use purchasing power to attract jobs to Cleveland while reducing its carbon footprint. Cleveland has the potential to become the most sustainable city in the nation but it will take a lot of hard work and forward thinking policies. Whether the 10-year contract with Sunpu-Opto is the right choice for Cleveland is up to city council, but the need to have a contract on the table with a company that would make its U.S. headquarters in Cleveland without taking any tax breaks, create hundreds of jobs and help CPP and the City of Cleveland to aggressively move forward with energy efficiency projects is critical to the economy, environment and future of our city.