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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2020-05-21 RMLD Board of Commissioners Minutes wN�re RE EIVED Town of ReadingTo?4 "CLERK ? 'c s READINC4, MA. �/ � .;' Meeting Minutes �`` 2021 AUG 23 PM 3: 42 wrovv°' Board - committee - commission - Council: RMLD Board of Commissioners Date: 2020-05-21 Time: 07:30 PM Building: Reading Municipal Light Building Location: Address: 230 Ash Street Session: Open Session Purpose: General Business Version: Final Attendees: Members- Present: Due to the pandemic and the March 12, 2020 Governor's Executive Order Suspending Certain Provisions of the Open Meeting Law, all particpants attended remotely. John Stempeck, Chair; David Hennessy, Vice Chair; David Talbot, Commissioner; Robert Coulter, Commissioner; Philip B. Pacino, Commissioner Members - Not Present: Others Present: RMLD Staff: Coleen O'Brien, General Manager; Charles Underhill, Director of Integrated Resources; Wendy Markiewicz, Director of Business, Finance, and Utility Technology; Hamid Jaffan, Director of Engineering and Operations; Tracy Schultz, Executive Assistant Karen Herrick, Select Board Vanessa Alvarado, Select Board Vivek Soni, Citizens' Advisory Board Minutes Respectfully Submitted By: Philip B. Pacino, Secretary Pro Tem Topics of Discussion: Call Meeting to Order Chair Stempeck called the meeting to order and read RMLD's Code of Conduct.Chair Stempeck announced that the meeting is being videotaped via Zoom for distribution to the community television stations in North Reading, Lynnfield,and Wilmington. Chair Stempeck asked Mr. Pacino to serve as Board Secretary and had all attendees identify themselves. Public Comment Mr.Pacino announced that Laude Cavagnaro,a longtime RMLD employee, passed away and stated that the Board sends its condolences. The Board concurred with the request and sends along it condolences to the Cavagnaro family. vage I 1 Report on Ci izens'Advisory Board Meeting on May 21,2020 Chair Stempeck stated That all four towns have approved the ten-year extensions to the Twenty- Year Agreement.The Town of Lynnfield uses Town Meeting to put the final stamp of approval.The CAB voted and approved the motions relative to the payment to the Town of Reading. RMLD Liaisons Ms. Alvarado thanked the Board for working with the Town. It will provide stability and predictability to the Town and RMLD. Payment to the Town of Reading Mr. Pocino made a motion, seconded by Mr. Talbot, that the current annual Town of Reading, below-the-line, payment of $2,480,506, be extended for payment dates of June 30, 2021 and December 31,2021, in the amount of$1,240,253 each. Roll call vote: Vice Chair Hennessy:Aye;Chair Stempeck:Aye;Mr.Talbot: Aye; Mr. Coulter: Aye; Mr. Pacino:Aye. Motion Carded:5:0:0. Mr.Pacino made a motion,seconded by Mr.Talbot,that the annual Town of Reading below-the- line payment calculation continue as two half payments on June 30, 2021 and December 31, 2021, and become that of 3.875 mils/kWh sale of The previous 3-year average of kWh sales from audited financial statements,starting with payment date June 30,2022. Roll call vote:Vice Chair Hennessy:Aye, Chair Stempeck:Aye; Mr.Talbot:Aye; Mr.Coulter: Aye; Mr. Pacino:Abstain. Motion Cabled:4:1:0(one abstained). Mr. Pacino proposed a substitute motion,seconded by Mr.Talbot: Move that the annual Town of Reading, below the line, payment be set based on a calculation formula of 3.875 mils/kWh multiplied by the average of the previous 3 years kWh sales from The 3 previous years' annual audited financial statements. Such payments to continue To be paid as half payments on June 30 and December3l of each year. Such payment To commence on June 30, 2022. The annual result of the calculation formula will be annually presented to The RMLD's Board of Commissioners 60 days in advance of the June 30 payment. In the event of any catastrophic event or events, as declared by the Department's General Manager, the RMLD's Board of Commission and the Department can adjust The payment to address the emergency. Catastrophic event or events will be defined by the General Manager of The RMLD. Mr.Talbot thanked Mr. Pacino for his input. Mr. Talbot stated that it was his understanding that it has always been understood that in the event of a catastrophe all bets regarding the payment were off. Mr. Pacino said his intention in adding it into the motion was to prevent any ambiguity going forward.Mr.Talbot stated his concerns about adding it to the motion and that since it has always been true so there's no need to vote on it.Mr.Talbot also stated that the payment will be clear at least sixty days,if not more, because anyone can look at the audited financials:there is no need to formalize that step. Mr.Talbot also expressed his wish this had been on a previous agenda. Mr. Pacino explained that he wants the Board to have a clear mandate to review the payment annually and that there should no ambiguity in the event of a major catastrophe event. Chair Stempeck stated the Board has that ability and that it's redundant to include it in the motion. With regard to advance notice Mr.Pacino stated he circulated the motion to all Board members two days in advance of the meeting. After further discussion Mr.Pacino withdrew the substitute motion. Vice Chair Hennessy at that point excused himself and left the meeting. Page 1 2 rGe�aleral Manager's Report D"Response to COVID-19 O'Brien stated that RMLD has a comprehensive Infectious Disease Outbreak Plan EOP 20-03 h has been shared with the Town's Incident Command as it has been updated. It is a Irving ument and is regularly updated as new information is received.RMLD's Emergency Response , comprised of senior management, has been meeting daily since March 3. The RMLD is ently in Phase VI under Remobilization toward normal operations and is approaching Phase e Emergency Response Team made changes to remobil¢ation on Tuesday to align with}he ernor's Monday order. This modification was related to office workers continuing to work otely.The Reading Board of Health has not yet indicated when 230 Ash Street can reopen.A y flow design has been put in place for when the building is opened. Public meetings will tinue virtually per the open meeting law relief order issued by the Governor. Public big nings will continue virtually,as allowed by the Attorney General's office.RMLD will continue to itor orders as they received and will update its living document accordingly. Use of the teria by Town organizations is suspended until further notice. Ms. O'Brien thanked the RMLD for working onsite and remotely,especially during the two storms that have occurred since beginning of COVID: customer power was restored in record time compared to other munities. Integrated Resources Division IRD Monthly Report and Variance Analysis Mr. Underhill began by addressing the impact of COVID on system loads and stated that when a baseline assessment of potential impacts was done, RMLD started with an eight percent loss of load and a corresponding loss of revenue. The first four months of the year come in below the 2019 actual results and the 2020 forecasted loads. COVID was not a factor for the first three months:the difference is due to warmer-than-normal weather conditions. April's loads are below The forecasted amount and this is likely due to COVID impacts. Mr. Underhill discussed heating degree days: January, February, and March were below normal. The April heating degree variance was cooler than normal but the heating degree days in April are half of what they are for January.A big part of the load variance is weather.COVID impacts will be clearer once May results are available. Mr. Underhill stated that he has looked at the NOAH expectations for the summer and it's supposed to be an EI Nino year:the Jetstream is expecting to stay in the far north which means the summer should be warmer than usual.Mr. Underhill reviewed non-power supply revenue in 2019 and 2020:2020 6 lower but not the eight percent that was potentially predicted. RMLD's revenue is holding up better than expected. Mr. Underhill then discussed the aging of RMLD accounts:this indicates whether RMLD customers are paying their bills.Six years of data was presented. 2020 is doing better in the first thirty days than a year ago. Accounts 31-60 days overdue are comparable to the last few years. An analysis of actual kWh by purchase was presented. Because loads are down RMLD sold back into the power supply pool. EV Impact Assessment Mr. Underhill stated that for electric vehicles(EVs)to go 100 miles they use 34 kWh.That is 2.94 miles per kWh. A gallon of gas produces the some result as roughly ten kWh. It was assumed that an electric vehicle in RMLD's service territory is primarily used as a second vehicle. A commute to work of 27 miles each way was assumed.That's 54 miles rounc trip, five days a week,45 weeks a year,for an annual total of 12,150 miles.At 2.94 miles per kWh that's 4,131 kWh per year.With on assumption that 75 percent of those kWh would be charged at home, that totaled 258 kWh per month, approximately 3,100 kWh per year.On average, RMLD residential customers use 750 kWh a month, 9,000 kWh per year. 3,100 kWh a year would increase that usage by 34 percent. It's estimated that there are at least 250 EVs in RMLD's service territory.That means there are 774,563 kWh attributed to EVs each year.It would take 2,260 EVs,with an annual EV load of 7,000,000 kWh hours, to account for one percent of RMLD's total annual load. Mr. Underhill stated that RMLD is trying to encourage electrification by offering rebates. Chair Stempeck asked what the impact on infrastructure would be with an increase in EVs. Mr. Underhill explained since EVs generally charge at night they would improve the system load factor.There's a potential risk of multiple level three chargers in the same neighborhood overloading transformers.To mitigate this. RMLD would be asking customers to charge at designated times.Chargers were discussed.Chair Stempeck Pa9e 13 EV Impact Assessment suggested asking Volta,a vendor RMLD is working with,to see if they have analysis regarding how many EVs are in RMLD's service territory. BD Program Activity Mr. Underhill stated that RMLD launched multiple efficiency programs earlier in the year. Preliminary numbers for participation were presented, including four heat pump rebates, two breaker panel upgrade applications, and a variety of electric landscaping equipment. Customer Notification System Mr. Underhill explained that an outage management system is being put in place. It includes a customer notification component:customers have begun to enroll in the program.A press release was sent out on May 8 and an e-mail was sent out to over 19,000 customers on May 11.There was a 57percenl open rate and a 15 percent click rate. 271 customers have signed up so for.There have been two issues: some customers had issues with the discounted bill field and Gmail was treating the email as spam.Instructions to circumvent the issues have been posted on the website. Engineering and Operations Report Mr. Jaffari reviewed major construction projects, including area upgrades on North Main Street and Lowell Street in Lynnfield and Dogwood Lane, Adams Street and Greenbrier Drive in North Reading. Work that requires a planned outage has been suspended due to COVID. Primary metering upgrades have been completed at Austin Prep in Reading and Fordham Road in Wilmington. Mr. Jaffari reviewed facilities projects: the parking lot, roof and back deck. Maintenance programs were discussed.RMLD is going to begin primary metering testing to ensure that the meters are measuring kWh accurately.The aged transformer replacement program has been slowed down due to COVID. Only transformers that don't require outages to be swapped out are being replaced. Mr. Jaffari reported on double poles, RMLD's reliability, and outage causes. Weather and free-related events have increased but equipment caused outages have decreased. Mr. Jaffari stated that in 2017, 2018, and 2019 RMLD received Certificates of Excellence in Reliability from APPA. RMLD Procurement Requests Requiring Board Approval RFO 2020-14 EVSE- Dual Pod Charging Stations Mr. Jaffari explained these chargers are for Analog.The bid was sent to four vendors. Mr. Pacino made a motion,seconded by Mr.Talbot,to recommend that the General Manager Through the Materials Manager purchase seven (7) dual port, wall mount, electric charging stations from UlyPad EV, LLC, Sourcewell Cooperative Contract 0051017-LPE, for $69,167.00, pursuant to M.G.L.c.30B and RMLD Policy Number 9. Roll call vote:Aye;Chair Stempeck:Aye;Mr Talbot:Aye;Mr.Coulter:Aye;Mr. Pacino:Aye. Motion Carried:4:0:0(one absent). Procurement Over$50,000-Vol Var Optimization (VVO)Software Mr.Jaffari explained that this is software that goes with the SCADA system.ISO is requiring a certain bandwidth at Station 3 and Station 4. During the peak times capacitors are turned on. Currently it's done manually.This will automatically monitor the system.It is a sole-source product. Mr. Pacino made a motion,seconded by Mr.Coulter,to recommend that the General Manager through the Materials Manager purchase VVO Software from Survalent Technology, Inc. for $153.893.00,pursuant to M.G.L.c.30B,and RMLD Policy Number 9. Roll call vote:Chair Stempeck:Aye; Mr.Talbot:Aye;Mr.Coulter:Aye; Mr.Pacino:Aye. Motion Carried:4:0:0(one absent). Page 1 4 General Discussion Meeting dates were discussed. Ms. Herrick asked if the Analog Devices chargers were for public access.Ms.O'Brien replied that they are on Analog's property but are owned by RMLD.Ms. Herrick asked the status of the Community Solar Project. Mr.Underhill relied that RMLD is moving forward and had sent a letter out to each town asking if they hod any questions or comments.There has been no reply.Mr. Underhill stated that he is sending out a follow up email tomorrow and will then publish the RFI to move the program forward. Adjournment At 9:03 p.m., Mr. Pacino made a motion, seconded by Mr. Coulter, that the Board go into executive session to consider the purchase of real property and to return to regular session for the sole purpose of adjournment. Roll call vote:Mr.Talbot:Aye;Mr. Pacino:Aye;Chair Stempeck:Aye; Mr.Coulter:Aye. Motion Carried:4:0:0(one absent). Adjournment At 9:18 p.m., Mr. Pacino made a motion,seconded by Mr.Talbot,that the Board adjoum. A true copy of the RMLD Board of Commissioners minutes as approved by a majority of the Commission. Philip B. Pacino,Secretary Pro Tem RMLD Board of Commissioners Page 1 5