Page 256 - Sustainable Cities and Communities Design Handbook

230 Sustainable Cities and Communities Design Handbook

Similarly, the Governor Davis Administration’s Office of Planning and
Research lead an effort to quantify the costs for installing and maintaining
renewable and “green” technologies for on-site power generation. The result of
an Interagency Working Group (over 50 active participants) was the revision
of the 1987 California Standard Practices Manual (SPM) to a version in 2001
that uses life cycle analysis and externalities to get the correct costs for
renewable energy in buildings. The SPM is becoming widely used by state and
local governments in costing out their installation of energy-saving technol-
ogies (Clark and Sowell, 2002). Governor Schwarzenegger is expected to
continue these programs and efforts.
Nonetheless, two critical issues remain and appear to be solvable. First is
the need to aggregate the demand for green building technologies and services.
The State community College District did just that under its Foundation, which
has a program to provide a competitive central purchasing contract using
LEED standards, criteria, and codes. This initiative implements the attempts of
the certified public accountants and CSFCC to do the same on a voluntary
basis. With a “competitively aggregated contracting” mechanism substantial
amounts of funds can be saved and controlled.
The second and perhaps even more significant issue is the standards, codes,
and rules themselves. The California Fuel Cell Partnership took the lead in
implementing a civic market mechanism in 1999. In answer to the need to get
industry and government to identify and solve mutual issues surrounding the
California “clean” air acts, especially the zero emission laws enacted in the
early 1990s, the Partnership holds semiannual meetings in Sacramento, which
requires paid memberships not only among the auto industry but also with fuel
suppliers (oil and gas), research laboratories, universities, and technology
companies. As noted earlier it collapsed and changed in the second decade of
the 21st century.
Finally, one of the most successful collaborative efforts was advanced by
the Governor Davis administration and appears to be duplicated and expanded
under Governor Schwarzenegger: setting renewable energy goals. Davis set in
2002 a Renewable Energy Portfolio Standard of 20% by 2017. Schwarze-
negger announced in 2003 a shortened time period for 20% renewables by
2010. Moreover, Schwarzenegger, is far more aggressive in pushing for a
“hydrogen economy” in the state sooner than later. However, it failed as he
was not willing to “invest” state funds into it (Clark, 2004a,b).

CONCLUSION: MAXIMIZING THE PUBLIC GOOD IN
ENERGY ECONOMICS

Civic markets have many attributes that are different from neoclassical the-
ories, although none are topics unfamiliar to those working in energy eco-
nomics. What is different is the emphasis that is given to besides the fact that it
is an emerging focus.