With word that natural gas prices likely will fall, it suddenly seems reasonable to skip some weatherization steps around the house this fall. Maybe even convince yourself you’ll think about them next year.

If you could make your home a little more comfortable, your household a little cheaper to manage, wouldn’t you start thinking about ways to do that in October? It really is the best time of year to think about ways to use less natural gas.

Even your utility supports this idea. No, really. Cheyenne Light Fuel & Power wants its 33,300 natural gas customers to use less fuel. They’re offering a pile of incentives that just might help you (or entice your landlord) to update some energy hogging appliances at www.cheyennelight.com. New furnace? Buy an Energy Star rated unit and get an incentive payment of $150. Natural gas or electric water heater? Again, buy Energy Star and see a $1 per gallon rebate. Or be very modern and install a tankless water heater for a $50 rebate.

Programmable thermostats qualify for a $20 cash incentive as long as it’s Energy Star rated. The most progressive energy users will even take advantage of the $150 cash rebate incentive when they complete a home performance audit with Advanced Air in Cheyenne, the only Energy Star rated provider in Laramie County.

Advanced Air’s Luke Sarne knows it’s hard to get people thinking about home heating costs in October when temperatures are so pleasant inside and out. This is exactly the right time to be thinking about weatherization which is really a fancy word for sealing air gaps, examining heating and cooling units, and adding more insulation. There is some magic in Sarne’s work though.

“It just so happens that the easier things to do are the cheaper things to do when it comes to weatherization,” Sarne says.

Take insulation, for example. In a standard Wyoming home with an attic, there are about two inches of insulation.

“You can have today up to five times the amount of insulation blown into your attic than you could when it was first built,” Sarne explains.
That quiet is the sound of money being saved, and it gets better. You can buy insulation in bulk and blow it into the attic yourself or hire a contractor to do it. Either way you’ll save on home heating.

While there are clear incentives to buying new appliances, it might not be in the family budget. Don’t sweat it, Sarne says. There’s a significant savings to be had in maintaining the furnace you do have. Replace the filters. Maintain the fan and blower wheels by keeping them dust free.

“This is really inexpensive,” Sarne says. “For about $100 a year, you can pay someone to maintain your heating and cooling systems, extend the life of those appliances, and realize savings all year long.”

Some are more committed to energy savings than others. The very serious savers are the same people who will invest a few hundred dollars to learn where to spend more money on their home.

Sarne realizes this is a very tough sell, and he promotes the Home Performance with Energy Star audit nonetheless. Advanced Air has two technicians certified to do this work. They’ll do the recommended work for the homeowner, who might also decide a bit of elbow grease is worth the effort.

For some, energy savings has to be so simple, a monkey could do it. For those people, making the move to CFLs, those funny shaped light bulbs, are the way to go. They can be 60-75 percent less expensive to operate than the traditional incandescent bulbs.

For others, the costs of weatherizing are simply too great. There is help available through a program called the Weatherization Assistance Program. Income-qualifying households can get the energy audit and weatherization services whether they own or rent their home. Insulation might be added to a home, along with weather stripping. Major appliances are checked to make sure they’re running safely. The goal of that program is, of course, saving money on home heating. To apply for this program, go to www.dfsweb.state.wy.us and find the “LIEAP & Weatherization for Home Heating Help” link or visit a Wyoming Department of Family Services office. You can also find applications at Cheyenne Light Fuel & Power or you can call 800-246-4421 and ask to have an application mailed to you.

There are lots of other helpful programs available in Laramie County every winter. EnergyShare Wyoming helps subsidize home heating costs and Cheyenne Light, Fuel & Power offers its budget billing program. Learn about both at www.cheyennelight.com.

Whether you enjoy winter or loathe it, one thing is certain.
“Weatherizing your home is an investment,” Sarne says, “and it’s one you’ll get to enjoy every day of the year.”

Weatherization is a smart move, but for some, the interest lies in just getting the bill paid.

A program called LIEAP (pronounced lee-ap) can help. LIEAP is a tax-payer funded program, and the amount of help provided to a household is based on the household’s income and the number of people living in the home as well as the type of fuel used to heat it, according to the Wyoming Department of Family Services.

To learn more about LIEAP, go to www.dfsweb.state.wy.us and find the “LIEAP & Weatherization for Home Heating Help” link or visit the Wyoming Department of Family Services office. You can also find applications at Cheyenne Light, Fuel & Power, or you can call 800-246-4221 and ask that an application be mailed to you.

LIEAP also offers a Crisis Assistance program in cases where residents are facing a life or health-threatening situation. The program helps cover utility hookup deposits and back bills to prevent a shut-off. Sometimes Crisis Assistance dollars are used to buy new furnaces.

Applying for LIEAP also offers an opportunity to have your home weatherized through the Weatherization Assistance Program. The programs are separate, but in Wyoming, it’s just one application. The goal is to seal air leaks, check out furnaces and other major appliances for safety issues, and sometimes replace furnaces.

Because of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (or ARRA), more money is being provided to Wyoming for its Weatherization Assistance Program, and that means those who qualify could see as much as $6,500 spent winterizing their home. A few factors are still in play when it comes to qualifying for this program, including income, disabilities, and ages of those living in the home. It doesn’t matter if you own or rent your home, making it worth it to apply for LIEAP and Weatherization.

“LIEAP and Weatherization Assistance certainly make things easier for families and elders in Wyoming,” DFS’ LIEAP Manager Brenda Ilg says. “Last year we saw a great deal of participation in these programs, and we’re hoping people apply this year, too, to make their winter easier.”

No one should ever attempt to trim any vegetation growing near or on any overhead power lines. Only line-clearance certified professionals are allowed to work around our power lines.

Electric power lines are usually located near the top of the utility pole, farthest from the ground. Cable TV and telephone wires run closer to the ground, below the power lines.

A Service drop has three wires spiraled around one another going from the transformer to the meter on your house. Cheyenne Light, Fuel & Power does not maintain vegetation located along the service drop. That is the property owner’s responsibility. Cheyenne Light will disconnect and reconnect the service drop free of charge in order for the home owner to trim or remove conflicting vegetation.

A Practical Method to Power Line Clearing

Cheyenne Light’s strategy toward keeping our power lines clear of vegetation growth is based on a consistent, planned vegetation maintenance cycle. We clear the entire length of the power line – from the substation to the last customer on the circuit – on a regular basis. This approach is more efficient than jumping around the system, pruning smaller sections of the power line. Our accepted method of line clearance provides you with more reliable service.

If Cheyenne Light maintenance crews notice a condition on a customer’s property that warrants immediate attention, they will leave a notice with contact information and an explanation of the necessary maintenance required.

Overgrown power lines can cause outages and damage to our facilities, requiring costly repairs. Our method of line maintenance provides a proactive and cost effective approach to maintaining the safety and reliability of electric service to our customers.

How Cheyenne Light Trims Trees

Cheyenne Light employs qualified arborists who follow guidelines for trimming trees near utility lines recommended by the International Society of Arboriculture (ISA), the Tree Care Industry Association (TCIA), and the National Arbor Day Foundation.

The optimal technique recommended for pruning trees away from power lines is called “lateral or directional pruning.” This method removes entire branches and limbs to the main trunk of the tree where trees naturally shed them. Future tree growth is then directed away from the power lines and re-growth is reduced.

Lateral or directional pruning is a widely accepted and supported process for pruning trees because it does not interfere with the tree’s natural defense system, which protects it from decay.

Planting the Right Tree in the Right Place

Small, immature trees planted today can grow into problem trees in the future. Selecting the right tree and planting it in the right place around power lines can eliminate potential safety hazards and improve the reliability of your electric service. In addition, your tree can achieve its proper height and form. For more information call Cheyenne Light, Fuel & Power at 1-866-264-8003.

In response to the public’s growing concern about the environment, Cheyenne Light, Fuel & Power has launched a new program to be part of the solution. The program is called the Power of Trees.

The Power of Trees is a community-focused program designed to raise public awareness about the positive impact trees have on our homes, communities, and the environment.

This spring and summer, Cheyenne Light and Black Hills Corporation employees are participating with community volunteers and other partners in Colorado, Iowa, Kansas, Nebraska, South Dakota, and Wyoming to launch the company’s annual tree-planting program. To date, 218 trees have been planted throughout Black Hills service territories as part of Black Hills’ and Cheyenne Light’s commitment to supporting a healthy environment while enhancing the landscape and promoting community partnerships.

Cheyenne Light employees join community volunteer groups to plant trees in public areas like schools, libraries, parks, and open spaces throughout our service territory. Training and guidance is provided through our partnership with Cheyenne Urban Forestry, the Laramie County Conservation District, and Trees Forever, an Iowa-based, non-profit organization involved in community tree-planting programs.

In Laramie County, Cheyenne Light Fuel & Power partnered with St. Mary’s Catholic School and the City of Pine Bluffs for two tree-planting projects. In May, Cheyenne Light employees and St. Mary’s students planted six trees in the school’s courtyard. On June 5, Girl Scouts and FFA members from Pine Bluffs rolled up their sleeves to help Cheyenne Light employees plant 30 trees in the new Pine Bluffs Business Park and nearby City Park.

“The Power of Trees program encourages employees and community volunteers to become actively involved in promoting a healthy environment,” said Mark Stege, Cheyenne Light, Fuel & Power’s Vice President of Operations. “Trees continue to contribute to our communities long after we’ve planted them. They help conserve energy, beautify neighborhoods, and create habitat for birds and other wildlife.”

Cheyenne Light and Black Hills Corporation volunteers will plant an estimated 253 trees this year through Power of Trees events scheduled into the fall. Last year, 266 trees were planted company-wide.

When placed correctly, trees not only contribute to a beautiful landscape, they also help shade and cool homes and businesses. U.S. Department of Agriculture officials say properly placed trees can lower your energy costs by as much as 20 percent.

Trees also consume carbon dioxide, which some experts believe contributes to global warming. An average tree absorbs about one ton of CO2 during the course of its lifetime, about the same amount saved in one year by driving a hybrid car.

Trees also help conserve energy. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, carefully positioned trees can save as much as 25 percent of a household’s energy consumption for heating and cooling.

While debate continues regarding the impact of human interaction on the environment, at least one thing is certain there’s something we can all do to promote a healthier environment.

Cheyenne Light participates in and sponsors environmentally responsible programs including an annual Energy Efficiency Awareness Day to educate consumers about the benefits of energy efficient equipment and appliances, and Energy Star’s National Change a Light Day to promote the use of compact fluorescent light bulbs to save energy. Cheyenne Light also offers customers cash-back incentives for making energy-saving home improvements.

The Power of Trees is about more than just planting trees. It’s about spreading knowledge that tress make our communities more environmentally friendly. It also teaches us how trees should be planted and maintained so their benefits can last for generations.

In many ways, the Power of Trees is a demonstration that everyone can make a difference.

Dear Valued Cheyenne Light Customer:

Energy and the environment are at the forefront of today’s media, politics, and in our daily lives. Utility companies face an ongoing challenge of balancing their customers’ need for electricity with the need to protect the environment. We promote energy efficiency and weatherization, and initiated a community tree planting program called The Power of Trees. We are also purchasing renewable wind generation from the nearby Happy Jack and Silver Sage Wind Farms. Through these and other efforts, we demonstrate respect for our land, water, and air as we comply with the spirit as well as the letter of important environmental laws.

We are concerned that the Administration and Congress are pushing for passage of a carbon tax, sometimes referred to as “cap-and-trade,” that would significantly increase our customers’ electric and natural gas utility bills. Under this greenhouse gas legislation, a cost or “hidden tax” would be imposed per ton of carbon dioxide (CO2) produced. Utilities and other industries will be forced to pass this cost along to customers.

Most of the power used to serve you is generated by coal-fired power plants. In fact, half the nation’s electricity supply is generated with coal. If Congress passes legislation that imposes a tax on CO2 emissions without adequate customer protections, we believe that these additional costs will create financial hardships for many of our customers. For example, cost increases of CO2 for Cheyenne Light’s electric customers could average 29 percent (at $20 per ton of CO2 emitted) to 73 percent or more. At $30 per ton of CO2 emitted natural gas costs would increase by $1.00 per dekatherm. (Under cap-and-trade, actual costs wouldn’t be determined by Congress, but by a new financial market that would be created to trade CO2 emissions allowances.)

On the back of this page is a U.S. map showing the percentage of coal generation by state correlated to the price of electricity. The map shows that the higher the reliance on coal, the lower the price of electricity. Under the current CO2 tax proposal, customers in coal-reliant states throughout the Midwest will pay a large share of this tax, while customers from less coal-reliant regions including California (1% coal generation) and the Northeast (2% coal generation) will pay much less.

We are thankful our Wyoming Senators Mike Enzi and John Barrasso and Congresswoman Cynthia Lummis have all resisted passing legislation that would implement a cap-and-trade program with no cost protections for customers. Please contact your delegation and thank them for protecting you from this hidden tax so they can use your support to influence others.

Congress has alternatives to “cap-and-trade” for addressing climate change concerns that pose lower risks to customers and the economy. To learn more about proposed greenhouse gas legislation or to write a letter to Congress, please visit www.cheyennelight.com/cap-and-trade.

We are changing as the energy world changes. We vow to keep you informed and to work with elected officials to protect your energy interests. Together, we hope to build a solid energy future. Thank you for being our customer. It is a privilege to serve you.

Sincerely,

Mark Stege

Vice President-Operations

Coal and natural gas power plants provide nearly 70 percent of the nation’s electrical supply, and both technologies emit significant quantities of CO2. More importantly, they provide around-the-clock power supplies, which are essential to provide reliable electric service. These resources will be increasingly necessary to back up intermittent wind, solar, and other renewable energy resources.

There is no technology available today that can readily replace coal and natural gas generation, and be deployed on a large scale in less than 10 to 20 years. It is important that legislative mandates for the reduction of CO2 not include implementation timetables that are ahead of the development of the necessary technology.

RAWLINS, Wyo. (AP) - The near-constant wind whipping across the rugged hills and ridges of southern Wyoming could soon power one of the world’s largest wind farms.

Power Company of Wyoming, an affiliate of Denver-based Anschutz Corp., wants to build 1,000 wind turbines, starting a few miles south of Rawlins, and a power line that could export the electricity to the desert Southwest.

At a projected cost of $4 to $6 billion for the wind farm alone, the proposal is the biggest of Wyoming’s burgeoning wind industry.

Power Company President Bill Miller said it only makes sense to pursue a project that’s big enough to deliver cost-competitive energy to consumers.

“To do an economically viable project, you have to have scope and scale. It has to be something that will drive itself,” said Miller, who directs The Anschutz Corp.’s natural resources division. “The faint of heart don’t do this.”

Wyoming has long been an energy state, drawing on its reserves of coal, gas and oil to help power the country. These days, with the Obama administration’s emphasis on clean and renewable energy, developers are racing to harness Wyoming’s ubiquitous wind.

The influx of wind developers has raised hopes for jobs and economic development, but has also prompted concerns about erecting hundreds of 230-foot-tall turbines on largely undeveloped land.

Locals and land managers, many of them veterans of the decade-long gas boom that brought a frenzy of development to Wyoming, point to the wind boom’s potential downsides for wildlife, landscape vistas and local infrastructure.

“We recognize the good and the bad,” Carbon County Commission chairman Terry Weickum said. “We’re trying to minimize the ill effects by having (the wind farms) well placed. Of course we all in Wyoming live here for a reason, and one of those reasons is hunting, and so wildlife corridors and habitat are important.”

The U.S. Department of Energy rates the wind resource of the high deserts and plains of southern and eastern Wyoming as being from good to superb.

Wyoming ranks 12th in the nation for its wind-energy production but has developed only about 1 percent of its potential wind capacity, according to the American Wind Energy Association, an industry group.

“What you need for a wind farm is to have strong wind and steady wind, and Wyoming has that,” said Suzanne Tegen, an energy analyst with the DOE’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Colorado.

Wyoming Gov. Dave Freudenthal recently likened the interest in Wyoming wind development to a “gold rush.” But it’s difficult to predict just how the wind boom will play out.

The American Wind Energy Association says the state’s existing wind farms have a capacity of 775 megawatts. A megawatt is enough electricity to power about 225 to 300 households.

Steve Ellenbecker, energy advisor to Freudenthal, said there are more than 40 wind developers that have existing or proposed projects in the state.

Meanwhile, developers have also proposed seven power lines with a potential combined capacity of about 20,000 megawatts to export electricity from Wyoming wind farms, according to the Wyoming Infrastructure Authority.

So far, the Power Company’s wind farm dwarfs any other proposals.

It’s a big jump into renewable energy for The Anschutz Corp., which is owned by Philip Anschutz, the founder of Qwest Communications.

The Anschutz Corp.’s investments range widely, from cattle ranching to energy development, publishing, and sports and entertainment. Last year, Forbes magazine ranked Philip Anschutz as the 36th richest American with a net worth of $8 billion.

The Power Company’s wind farm - known as the Chokecherry and Sierra Madre Wind Energy Project - would sit on about 154 square miles on the Overland Trail Cattle Company, a ranch that Anschutz Corp. has owned for 15 years. The ranch, which is located about 185 miles northwest of Denver, is comprised of private land mixed in a checkerboard with Bureau of Land Management and state lands.

The Power Company says the 1,000 turbines would generate between 2,000 and 3,000 megawatts of energy. By comparison, the world’s largest existing wind farm is the 421-turbine, 736-megawatt Horse Hollow wind farm in Texas, according to the American Wind Energy Association.

A sister project, The Anschutz Corp.’s proposed TransWest Express power line would carry power - most likely from the wind farm and possibly other sources - from southern Wyoming to a Las Vegas-area substation. Miller, who also heads the TransWest subsidiary, said the line would cost about $3 billion to build. The company plans to begin holding public meetings on the project in conjunction with the BLM this summer.

The BLM is conducting an environmental study of the proposed wind farm. It will examine its effect on everything from bats to big game, the nearby historical Overland Trail, the view from area towns and hunting access to public lands. The agency plans to make a decision on the project by early 2011.

Wyoming Game and Fish Department biologists say sage grouse, mule deer, pronghorn antelope, elk and a variety of raptors are some of the wildlife that live in the project area.

The project could face some environmental hurdles during the permitting process. The proposal calls for placing turbines within designated crucial winter range for mule deer and within the state’s “sage grouse core areas,” or areas Wyoming has identified as prime habitat that should be protected for the birds.

Erik Molvar, executive director of the Laramie-based Biodiversity Conservation Alliance, said the project should be modified to “make it a lot smaller and less intrusive and less impactful for sage grouse in order to minimize the controversy surrounding it.”

Miller said the Power Company’s plans are developing as it gathers data on the best sites for the turbines - both for wind potential and to avoid environmental conflicts. The company aims to begin construction in 2011 and achieve full production by the end of 2013.

“Our business is to build the best, most efficient, highest capacity wind farm that can possibly be built in this resource, while at the same time recognizing every one of the issues we have to deal with, whether it’s antelope, sage grouse, cultural, the Overland Trail viewshed,” Miller said. “We’re going to impact every one of those things. But we’re going mitigate to the extent we can.”

The BLM officials who are analyzing the Power Company’s proposal realize their work on wind development projects in the region has only just begun.

Patrick Madigan, field manager for the bureau’s Rawlins Field Office, said he carries a map showing the placement of dozens of wind-measurement towers on BLM land around southeastern Wyoming.

“I take this map out with me to show anybody who will listen to me, basically, this is what’s coming,” Madigan said.