Spring 2019

INSIDE: Energy Talk | Local Solar Energy Powered by Community | What is Clean Energy?PUD Receives National Award for Environmental Improvements | Fresh News About PUD Water

Keeping the Power Flowing | Smart Rewards for Conservation | Looking to the Future

snopud.com

Energizing Life in Our

Communities

Energizing Life in Our Communities! That’s the PUD’s new tagline, and as your elected board, we’re focused on helping all of our customers

live life to its fullest. That means delivering safe and reliable power at the lowest possible cost to every household and business in our service territory. Our customers have made it clear that clean energy is also a priority. As commissioners of a public utility, we are responsive to our customers. Recently, we worked closely with the City of Edmonds to deliver 100% clean energy to all city-owned buildings. The PUD’s current fuel mix is considered 98.6% car-bon-free, and we continue to support renewable resources. In April, we were proud to unveil a new way for PUD customers to support renewable energy produced locally. The PUD’s first Community Solar program allows cus-tomers to purchase solar energy units and receive a credit on their bill, making solar energy more accessible for our customers. For more information on Community Solar, see Page 4. Over the past two months, the PUD held a number of open houses designed to inform customers on the Com-

munity Solar program. The turnout was amazing! As your public power utility board, we are encouraged when our customers take an active role in guiding us as we develop policies and services. We encourage you to attend an up-coming board meeting, held twice each month at our Ever-ett headquarters. It’s our privilege to serve you!

Meet the Commissioners

A Few Words from the CEO/GM

Toni Olson, Rebecca Wolfe and Sid Logan

John Haarlow

Hello, Snohomish County and Ca-mano Island! While I have had the privilege of leading your PUD since October, this is my first chance to really introduce myself. I’m John Haarlow, CEO/General Manager of Snohomish PUD. I’m new to the position but have been with this dynamic organization since February 2017 as the Assistant General Man-ager over Distribution Services. Before that, my wife, daughter and I lived in New Mexico where I worked for a util-ity there. This is the first time in my career that I have had the opportunity to work for a public, not-for-profit utility, and can I just say that I love it. The op-portunity to work in service to our cus-

tomer/owners to bring you improved reliability, increased customer services, a clean, renewable power mix, and what we hope from your view is exceptional value for your electric and water service excites me every day. These are rapidly changing times in our society and challenging times for

utilities. As we work to stay ahead of increasing customer expectations, we are also planning for what you, our cus-tomers, will want from us in the future. We’re reviewing our rate design op-tions for equity and flexibility, improv-ing our customer self-serve opportu-nities for more convenience, exploring ways to better support electric vehicles and customer-sited solar energy, and bringing more information to your fin-gertips through more advanced meter-ing options. What a fantastic opportu-nity for us to serve our customers and communities in Snohomish County. No matter how you look at it, our future is bright. We have skilled, thoughtful, hard-working employees in place, and we all look forward to bringing you our best.

Editors: Aaron Swaney/Cayle Thompson | Design: Wendy ParrisPhotography: Krysta RasmussenEmail your comments to: current@snopud.com Vol. 31 Number 1 | Published May 2019

Energy Talk ContentsPAGE 4 & 5

Local Solar Energy Powered by Community

» What is a Microgrid?

PAGE 6 & 7

What is Clean Energy?

Keeping the Power Flowing

PAGE 7

PUD Receives National Award for Environmental Improvements

Fresh News About PUD Water

BACK COVER

Smart Rewards for Conservation

Looking to the Future

Enlightening NewsWe’ve made improvements to our outage map we think you’ll appre-ciate. We’ve heard your requests for estimated times of restoration (ETRs), and now have a system in place to make it happen! Yep, you read that right, ETRs are here! Next time you have an outage, check our outage map to find the estimate (ETR) for your area. ETRs will be available at all times except during major storms (too much is happening at those times for ETRs to be accurate).

No Rate IncreaseInternal cost control measures and stronger than expected financial re-sults in 2018 led to the PUD’s Board of Commissioners approving no rate increases in 2019. The PUD’s residential rate remains 10.4 cents per kilowatt-hour, keeping it competitive with other Northwest elec-tric utility rates and below the national average of 12.95 cents/kWh.

Click to Translate!Thanks to Google Translate, we’re helping more customers through snopud.com. Whatever your preferred language, we’ve got you cov-ered. Quickly translate our website into more than 100 languages, making it easier to find energy conservation tips, and learn more about special offers through the PUD. It’s simple! Visit snopud.com and find “Select Language” at the very bottom of the page.

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Customer Service (M-F, 8 a.m. - 5:30 p.m.) 425-783-1000

Energy Hotline Your source for energy-efficiency information (M-F, 8 a.m. - 5 p.m.) 425-783-1700

Current Spring 2019 3Energizing Life in Our Communities2 Current Spring 2019 Energizing Life in Our Communities

Local Solar Energy Powered by Community

In April, we put the energizing power of the sun in the hands of PUD customers! The PUD recently launched its first Community Solar Project and

units were quickly snapped up. At the time of printing, the solar array is almost sold out. Participating custom-ers will soon begin receiving bill credits for energy pro-duced by the 500 kW solar array next to our Arlington

Microgrid project. Community Solar was the perfect option for those who wanted to support clean, green and renewable energy, but lacked the space, permission or budget to install a solar array on their own home.

Fast Fact: The PUD’s Community Solar project generates enough energy to power about 50 homes annually. But because almost any PUD customer could participate, potentially thousands can benefit!

PUD builds the solar array

Energy generated by the solar array goes out to the overall grid

Full cost of buy-in is expected to be recouped in less than 10 years

Customers buy units through the Community Solar Program

Community Solar participants receive a credit on their bill from the energy generated by the solar array every month for up to 20 years

For more information visit snopud.com/communitysolar

Here’s how the Community Solar Project Works:

What is a Microgrid?A microgrid is a closed-loop system in which power can be generated, stored, and used. Community Solar is one element of the larger Arlington Microgrid Proj-ect. In the event of a major disaster affecting power to all of Snohomish County, the Arlington Microgrid can power PUD emergency operations. This will help us quickly coordinate and communicate with teams as repairs begin in earnest.

Other exciting features of the Microgrid Project:• PUD will test vehicle-

to-grid (V2G) charging, technology that could soon allow your electric car to power your home during an outage.

• The Clean Energy Technology Center will help educate the public about rapidly evolving technologies in the energy world.

Electric Vehicle Chargers

Clean Energy Technology Center 1 megawatt

energy storage system

500 kilowatt solar energy system

Solar tree

Elements of the Microgrid:

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What is Clean Energy?

What does clean energy mean to you? Some think about it in terms of renewable en-ergy, while others focus on energy sources

that create less pollution. According to the U.S. De-partment of Energy, clean energy includes solar, hydro, wind, bioenergy, geothermal, nuclear and hydrogen and fuel cells. Under that definition, the PUD’s power sup-ply is already 98.6% clean. That’s really, really clean!

To meet future growth, PUD leaders are actively researching and developing other sources of power to create a more balanced mix of energy sources and help supplement purchases from BPA with clean energy. It starts with conservation, the most cost-effective

means of meeting future energy needs, and includes innovative projects

like the PUD’s Community Solar project in Arlington.

DemandResponse

EnergyStorage*

Clean EnergyA broad term encompassing energy

production and actions, including energy- e�ciency savings, that aim to create a more

sustainable environment

Renewable Energy

Energy collected from resources naturally replenished on a

human timescale

Carbon-Free Energy

Resource that does not produce carbon dioxide when

generating energy

Solar

WindBioenergy

ConservationHydro

GeothermalNuclear

Tidal

Hydrogen & Fuel Cells*

*Depends on underlying fuel source

As a public power utility, the PUD sets its rates to cover the cost of doing business. The cost of delivering safe, afford-able and reliable power to our customers comes in three forms:

• Fixed costs: These include billing, meter reading and base amounts of infrastructure (poles, lines, transformers, etc.) required to serve customers along with the labor that it takes to maintain these facilities.

• Capacity costs: These include additional infrastructure and labor costs that are required to meet peak demand.

• Variable costs: The energy it takes to power customers’ homes, businesses and more.

Keeping the Power Flowing

The PUD is constantly seek-ing ways to improve service to our customers while

limiting impacts on the environ-ment, and the work is paying off. In April, the National Hydropower Association presented the PUD with its 2018 Outstanding Stew-ards of America’s Waters award for Operational Excellence. The award recognizes the PUD’s exten-sive work to improve conditions for salmon and other aquatic life down-stream of the Spada Lake Reservoir. As part of relicensing require-ments for the Henry M. Jackson Hydroelectric Project, the PUD

PUD Receives National Award for Environmental Improvements

Fresh News About PUD Water

Metering & billing

($$)

Service drop & transformer ($) Substation &

transmission lines ($$)

Poles & distribution

lines ($$$)

was required to warm the waters immediately downstream of the Culmback Dam, better reflecting seasonal temperature differences. Prior to the project, all water re-leased into the Sultan River came from the base of the reservoir, which is naturally colder than the water near the top. By comparison, water used for energy generation is pulled in from varying depths through a separate intake that is positioned higher in the reservoir.

PUD engineers saw an oppor-tunity. A 715-foot-long tunnel was constructed to connect some water flowing through the power tunnel to water flowing out the base of the dam. This allows for the two sources of water to be mixed as needed for seasonal temperature adjustments while ensuring year-round compli-ance with state water quality criteria. The upgrades are expected to im-prove fish growth, expand fish dis-tribution, and add resiliency to the fish population in the Sultan River downstream of the dam.

The PUD delivers safe and reliable drinking water to more than 21,000 homes in Lake Stevens, Granite Falls, and areas near Ar-lington and Lake Goodwin. In 2018, the PUD replaced more than 11,000 feet of water main, installed 345 new connections, took more than 1,000 water quality samples, and completed a three-year effort to take over the Warm Beach water system. In 2019 the PUD plans to replace another 7,000’ of aging water mains in the Lake Stevens area.

PUD’s Water Utility oversees:

• 10 separate water systems spread throughout the county

• 196 square miles of service area

• 396 miles of pipe

• 17 reservoirs

• 4 treatment plants

Did you know? The average residential home uses 78,000 gallons of water every year!

Meter Reader115/

230kv

Current Spring 2019 7Energizing Life in Our Communities6 Current Spring 2019 Energizing Life in Our Communities

P.O. Box 1107Everett, WA 98206-1107

PRSRT STDU.S. Postage

PAIDSeattle, WA

Permit No. 7047

ECRWSSPOSTAL CUSTOMER

Snohomish County PUD believes in putting power in the hands of

customers. Future goals include an eventual move to Advanced Metering.

Customer benefits would include easier access to your energy profile, more accurate statements and improved

outage response time.

The PUD is proud to help customers find ways to conserve en-ergy and put money back in your pocket. Beginning in May, our instant rebates are even better for residential customers, with improved incentives on heat pumps. The PUD continues to of-fer smart reward incentives on energy-efficient appliances and smart thermostats, as well as special low pricing on LED light bulbs and more. The PUD also offers rebates and incentives to businesses looking to improve their energy efficiency. To learn more about both, check out snopud.com.

Smart Rewards for Conservation

Looking to the Future

FACT: In 2018, the PUD’s business incentives helped the Snohomish School District save $39,000 on a major HVAC upgrade, or approxi-mately 18% of the total expense! Improved efficiency will continue to save the school district an additional $11,500 a year in energy costs, money that goes right back into the classroom and student education.

Electric vehicles are in the fast lane! In 2017, there were

2,950 EVs registered in Snohomish County. As of Dec. 2018, there were

4,400. According to projections, there will be about 40,000 in

the county by 2029!

The PUD is working to make it easier for customers to engage

with us. Later this year, we plan to launch a new self-service customer portal that will allow you to access your account anytime to check on

usage, get outage updates and more!

“The whole project was just astonishing... Thank you. It was a great experience, and great people to work with.”

–Rebecca Sheppard, Resource Conservation Manager for Snohomish School District