special report: innovation & sustainability - 2010

Vol. 28, No. 31

© Entire contents copyright 2010 by Gemini Publications. All rights reserved.

2010/2011SPECIAL REPORT

Innovation/ Sustainability

2 GRAND RAPIDS BUSINESS JOURNAL SPECIAL REPORT 2010/2011

Green Generation Supports Your LEED Project!By participating in Consumers Energy’s Green Generation Program, you can use renewable energy purchases toward the certification of your LEED project.

West Michigan is a leader in Sustainability and LEED initia-tives, and the Green Generation program is there to help!

Visit us atwww.greengeneration.com

or call(800) 241-3368 to sign up!

SPECIAL REPORT 2010/2011 GRAND RAPIDS BUSINESS JOURNAL 3

PUBLISHERJohn H. Zwarensteyn:

[email protected]

EDITORCarole Valade: [email protected]

MANAGING EDITORGary Pullano: [email protected]

COPY EDITORDonna Ferraro: [email protected]

STAFF REPORTERSDavid Czurak: [email protected] Daly: [email protected] Himmelspach:

[email protected] Slowik: [email protected]

DESIGN & PRODUCTION MANAGERScott Sommerfeld:

[email protected]

ASSISTANT DESIGN & PRODUCTION MANAGERChristopher H. Pastotnik:

[email protected]

ART COORDINATORKelly J. Nugent: [email protected]

DESIGNERS/PRODUCTION ASSISTANTSMelissa Brooks: [email protected] Vargo: [email protected]

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERSMichael Buck, Jim Gebben, Johnny Quirin

GENERAL SALES MANAGERRandy D. Prichard:

[email protected]

ADVERTISING SALES CONSULTANTSChristina McDonald Meister:

[email protected] R. Rich: [email protected] VanGessel: [email protected]

ADVER. SALES ASSISTANT/COORDINATOR Karla Jeltema: [email protected]

CIRCULATION & MARKETING MANAGERScott T. Miller: [email protected]

CIRCULATION & MARKETING COORDINATOR

Jocelyn Burkett: [email protected]

CIRCULATION & MARKETING ASSISTANTShane Chapin: [email protected]

FINANCE & ADMINISTRATION MANAGERPamela Brocato, CPA:

[email protected]

ACCOUNTING & CREDIT ASSISTANTBev Horinga: [email protected]

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANTTina Gillman: [email protected]

RECEPTIONIST/CLERICAL ASSISTANTGeneral Inquiries: [email protected] Mabie, Linda Wilson

TO ORDER REPRINTSKarla Jeltema: [email protected]

(616) 459-4545

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When Grand Rapids beat out mid-sized city finalists Dav-enport, Iowa, and Hoover,

Ala., in the competition for the 2010 Sie-mens Sustainable Community Awards earlier this year, it further validated the area’s progress as a sustainable region.

The Business Journal has chroni-cled the evolution of the area’s sustain-able progress in dozens of stories in the past few years. Some of the past few months’ examples are documented in this 2010/2011 Special Report: Innova-tion/Sustainability.

Underwritten by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Business Civic Leader-ship Center and Siemens Corp., the award winners were announced in May. The finalists were selected based on their outstanding efforts to achieve complementary economic, environ-mental and social goals, as well as to im-prove the overall quality of life within their communities.

“This shows that we have a great mid-sized community that has done some incredible things around sustain-ability,” said Jeanne Englehart, presi-dent and CEO of the Grand Rapids Area Chamber of Commerce. “It signifies that public and private partnerships have borne fruit. It elevates the Grand Rapids community to another national platform to say what we are doing is very unique for a mid-sized city.”

Grand Rapids Mayor George Heart-well said such national recognition further validates the quality of life and economic opportunities found here. “What we’ve come to understand as being most important is attracting and retaining talent — young, educated, cre-ative people. This recognition shows that what we’re doing in this regard can’t be overstated.”

Both Englehart and Heartwell point-ed to the triple-bottom-line progress in the area of sustainability and its bene-fits to business growth and success.

“It begins as part of municipal plan-ning — focusing on the economy, the environment and social equity,” said Heartwell, who in 2005 pledged that more than 20 percent of the city’s pow-er would come from renewable sources by 2008. Grand Rapids was successful in reducing energy consumption by more than 10 percent through the use of technology like LED lighting and con-

servation. The city is now committed to 100 percent renewable energy by 2020.

“We’ve done such things as making a regional investment in transit and have seen paybacks for the community and for business with The Rapid and its phenomenal growth in ridership the past eight years. On the economic side, there have been investments in health care, and the way we have built that sector and city’s role in that has been providing and making investment in infrastructure that supports that work. We’ve provided incentives for building development and redevelopment with such programs as the Smart Zones.”

“There is a lot of documentation and statistics to validate what we were say-ing (in the award application) — things like national leadership in LEED build-ing, being No. 4 in the nation. Grand Rapids has its roots in manufacturing, and there has been a huge interest in redevelopment of brownfield property,” Englehart said. “This has led to signifi-cant investment by businesses that have diversified our economy. There’s been something like 275 acres of reclaimed property and over a billion dollars in investment.”

“This (award) is huge for us — the city of Grand Rapids and this whole region,” Heartwell said. “It’s an affirma-tion that the work we’ve been doing the past six years or more is on target.

Heartwell added: “It’s a reflection of the investment that business has made in sustainability, and that government has been a part of.”

Englehart emphasized the “payoff” for the recognition could come in the form of how others change their per-ception of Grand Rapids and Michigan.

“This really gives us a piece of the national stage,” she said.

GR: Most sustainable mid-sized city tells taleAward puts region on national stage.

The Business Journal has chronicled the evolution of the area’s sustainable progress in dozens of stories in the past few years. Some of the past few months’ examples are documented in this 2010/2011 Special Report: Sustainable Business and Technology.


Elizabeth Slowik Grand Rapids Business Journal

Can “a dirty, greasy trucking company” go green?

Robinson Cartage Presi-dent David Scripps wasn’t sure, but he took a leap of faith and shared intimate details of the firm, founded by his great-grandfather, with a class in Aquinas College’s sustainable business program.

The result was a student-made Microsoft Excel-based multi-modal calculator for mea-suring Robinson Cartage’s “car-bon footprint,” a combination of fuel usage and efficiency esti-mates that the company is using to review trucking practices.

The approach is uncom-mon for companies like Rob-inson Cartage, which special-izes in heavy industrial hauling, Scripps said.

“It sounded great,” Scripps said. “I hadn’t really considered that. I just didn’t think I’d be a candidate for green — a dirty industry like this.”

Tabbed for moving large, heavy and unwieldy loads such as machinery, bridge supports and wind turbine parts through-out North America, Robinson Cartage, 2712 Chicago Drive SW, employs 35 people, owns 25 tractors and 125 trailers. The company specializes in deliver-ies to Mexico.

Scripps was approached by Bruce Thompson of Rockford-Berge, Rockford Construc-tion Co.’s joint venture in wind farms with Spanish firm Bergé Logística Energética and the MAPA Group. Thompson, a 1985 Aquinas grad, was team-teaching the Sustainable Busi-ness Innovations Lab as an ad-junct with Associate Professor Deb Steketee, executive direc-tor of the college’s Center for Sustainability.

Steketee said the class is a requirement for the students in Aquinas’ sustainable busi-ness program. She said it was the first time the class took on a real-world business dilemma.

“That was a great experience for the students, to understand the nature of doing business to-day, particularly as we redefine the economy,” Steketee said.

Additional speakers ad-dressed issues such as design and public policy. She said the class was a learning experience for the instructors, as well. “It brought in interesting chal-lenges for students and for us as educators, in rethinking the terms of teaching and learning,” Steketee said.

“We were learning together, introducing students to the in-novation process, understand-ing team dynamics and also self-structuring. Bruce and I served as mentors and touch-stones in the process.”

Thompson had turned to Robinson Cartage to consider the problem of transporting large and heavy turbine compo-nents to wind-harvesting sites.

Scripps said he cares about the environment, but is not “an environmentalist.”

“When I first started the class, we were talking about a logistics company that would provide green transportation for these wind projects because they are anything but green: Getting the components there, getting them constructed — it’s very ungreen,” Scripps said.

At Thompson’s request, Scripps made a presentation to the seven students, who had no knowledge of the truck-ing industry, and even brought them out to the company to see the equipment and the size of the loads. The students, dub-

bing themselves “Team Blade,” studied technology, competi-tion, customers and regulation in the heavy hauling industry. Then they researched ways that Robinson Cartage could move toward an environmentally friendly approach.

“We never were able to cal-culate our carbon footprint,” Scripps said. “So they came up with a carbon calculator for me.”

One of Scripps’ customers, Burke Porter Machinery Co., which provided equipment for automotive testing, agreed to share details about a transpor-tation job for which it hired Robinson Cartage.

Team Blade discovered that determining the carbon foot-print for an individual delivery job involved a huge number of variables, from fuel type to driver habits to delivery meth-od. The team was unable to uncover another company in heavy hauling that was able to provide emissions information to its customers.

The students researched the environmental impact of various transportation modes — truck, rail, water and even air — and came up with formulas to determine the carbon footprint of each for any given job.

“Even more difficult to find was a calculator capable of pro-viding emissions for a shipment sent by a combination of truck,

rail and maritime,” Thompson said.

The calculator does not take price or time into consideration — both obviously important fac-tors for Scripps’ business. Still, he said, the results have been useful in analyzing fuel usage.

“Each month, we’re measur-ing what our idle time is, what our empty miles versus our loaded miles, our fuel usage. So we’re using that as tool to try to, first of all, measure. We’ve never measured those things before,” Scripps said.

“We take that information and try to use that informa-tion to reduce the fuel usage. … Part of it is educating drivers on their driving habits.”

Scripps said Robinson Cart-age is one of the few heavy transportation companies of its ilk to sign up as a SmartWay Partner with the Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA’s SmartWay is a program aimed to help logistics and trucking firms reduce emissions, im-prove fuel usage and cut down on pollution.

Robinson Cartage revamped its website at www.robinson-cartage.com to emphasize its new commitment to green busi-ness, he added.

“We’ve made some pretty good relationships out of all this — all this coming together: Rob-inson, Burke Porter and Aqui-nas College,” Scripps said.

Aquinas students, Robinson Cartage team bring green to heavy hauling

ROBINSON CARTAGE PRESIDENT David Scripps worked with Aquinas College students in determining how the company could move toward an environmentally friendly approach.


State certification program growing, and there’s no fee.

David CzurakGrand Rapids Business Journal

DeVos Place, Grand Valley State University’s Eberhard Center, three downtown hotels and a local bed-and-breakfast busi-ness have gone green — but using state documentation and not LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council.

By taking that route, all six can tell everyone on the planet about their environmentally sound and energy-efficient op-erations without having to pay anyone a dime.

The city’s convention center and the Eberhard Center both were certified as “Stewards” in the Green Venues Michi-gan program. The Holiday Inn Hotel, the JW Marriott and Peaches Bed & Breakfast have been certified as “Leaders” in the Green Lodging Michigan program, while the Amway Grand Plaza Hotel has earned “Steward” status in the same statewide program.

Both programs are run by the Bureau of Energy Systems, a division within the Michigan Department of Energy, Labor & Economic Growth.

Roger Doherty manages the programs from his office in Lansing. He said the Green Lodging effort made its debut in October 2006, back when the bureau was known as the Mich-igan Energy Office.

The idea to certify the state’s hotels as green wasn’t an origi-nal one. Doherty said his bu-reau and the state’s environ-mental department knew that a few other states offered such a

program.So the two agencies modeled

Green Lodging Michigan on the existing examples as a way to help the industry compete for travel and tourism dollars.

“Tourism is a big part of Michigan’s economic situation, so that’s why lodging was cho-sen,” said Doherty.

“We wanted to help lodging as much as we could to attract more tourism, to help the lodg-ing facilities do well and to help them hire more people. Just because of the scale of how im-portant lodging and tourism is to Michigan’s economy is prob-ably why.”

Creating the Green Venues program was a natural spinoff for the industry as a whole, once the bureau saw the hotel effort begin to pick up steam.

“The venues one has a re-lationship to tourism, as well, with it focusing on entertain-ment venues, conference fa-cilities and convention facilities that don’t qualify for the lodg-ing program. But a lot of the green practices for them would be similar as a lodging facil-ity, but for a lack of beds,” said Doherty.

“Now this one, we weren’t aware of anyone else doing it, and we used our own Green Lodging program as the mod-el,” he added.

Doherty said the bureau had not talked about adding anoth-er green program for another building classification such as retail. In early 2009, Meijer Inc. Chairman Hank Meijer told an audience at DeVos Place that every new store the retailer builds would be built accord-ing to LEED standards. But he also said the company would not seek LEED certification because of the cost involved to gain that status.

If the state would extend its program to companies like Mei-jer, then those businesses could get the bureau’s designation at no charge. The state doesn’t re-quire an applicant to pay a fee to be certified, while the cost for a designation from the US-GBC can run into six figures.

“The venues program still seems new to us, and we’re still trying to get a handle on that

and get that program out there more than it is at this point,” said Doherty.

“A year ago or so, we weren’t really expanding in any direc-tion. Then shortly after that, we started to think (venues) might fit here and let’s do it. So it doesn’t mean that we won’t, as we go forward. But there have not been any discussions or plans to yet. If the venues program proves to be success-ful, obviously that will increase the likelihood of moving in ad-ditional areas.”

Doherty said the bureau has been pleased with the response the effort has received. “We have seen it grow exponentially since 2006. We started with six facilities that were part of an initial pilot program.”

Doherty said charging a fee for certification was never con-sidered.

Although many of the guide-lines the state offers for achiev-ing certification are the same as the LEED standards, he point-ed out that the two programs are different in various ways,

beginning with the fact that the Michigan programs are less complicated.

“The bulk of the effort to become certified is actually done by the facilities them-selves. They fill out the paper-work, make the assessment and checklist and all that sort of thing and submit it. We just review it. We try to make it as simple as possible and yet still have a value in helping them to do more green practices, and then communicate what they’re doing to everybody else,” said Doherty.

Both venue and lodging get funded by the U.S. Department of Energy. Those dollars aren’t specifically designated for the program, as the money is part of a larger distribution that every state receives from the federal agency.

“It’s just one of the pro-grams some of that money is for. I don’t know of any other state that is using that source of funding for their programs,” said Doherty. “I think (charg-ing) a fee would be a barrier.”

Not LEED, still green performers

THE JW MARRIOTT has been certified as one of the area’s “Leaders” in the Green Lodging Michigan program.

“The bulk of the effort to become certified is actually done by the facilities themselves.” Roger Doherty


Gasified turkey lit-ter will power a feed mill in Howard City.

Pete DalyGrand Rapids Business Journal

A Kentwood company has completed a biomass energy plant at a feed mill in Howard City that could dramatically in-crease its owner’s energy inde-pendence.

“It (is) the first biomass turbine assembly powered by manure in the world,” said Da-vid Prouty, president of Heat Transfer International.

The biomass gasification power generation system that HTI designed, manufactured and installed at Sietsema Farm Feeds turns turkey litter into syngas — similar to natural gas — that is then used to make heat and electricity required in the production of turkey feed. A modified turbine engine is powered by the oxidizing syn-gas to generate electricity.

The SALT retort began op-eration in September 2009. SALT stands for starved air/low temperature. The device works like an oven that “bakes” any type of organic matter in an oxygen-starved environment. Most of the turkey litter “turns into this combustible gas,” said Prouty, leaving only a small amount of ash that has value as fertilizer.

“The USDA has said, ‘If this works like you guys say it will work, we will roll it out to ev-ery agribusiness organization

in the country,’” said Prouty.The U.S. Department of Ag-

riculture provided Sietsema Farms Feed with a $500,000 rural development grant to-ward the project, after the Michigan Department of Ag-riculture provided an initial $200,000 Agricultural Inno-vation Grant for a study that demonstrated the feasibility of using turkey litter as an energy source.

Gasification is not new: Coal gas used to be burned in street lights across the country. Dur-ing World War II, nearly one million cars in Europe were run on such gas because of the lack of conventional gasoline.

However, Sam Hogg, a biomass market specialist at NextEnergy in Detroit, said the Sietsema feed mill project probably is the first biomass-to-electricity system using “an air turbine, for sure.” NextEn-ergy is a nonprofit organization promoting investment in wind, solar, new battery technology and other related alternative energy markets.

Hogg said he believes few companies in the world have the expertise in biomass tech-nology that HTI has.

Prouty was one of the found-ers of Thermocon Corp. in Dutton, which customizes and modifies standard commercial heating and air conditioning equipment. In 2005, Thermo-con launched a new division: HTI. One year ago, Prouty sold his ownership in Thermocon and bought 100 percent of HTI, then moved it to Kentwood. He said he bought HTI “because

I think this is where the fun is and (where) the world is head-ed.”

Prouty said Harley Sietsema is also “a pioneer” in waste bio-mass gasification. Sietsema, who lives in Allendale and owns Sietsema Farms Feed, also owns or has interests in West Michigan farms that raise a total of 1.3 million turkeys per year.

The new biomass gasifi-cation plant is designed to produce about 460 kilowatts of electricity — enough for about 400 homes, according to Prouty, and it also produces enough heat to warm about 150 homes on the “coldest Michi-gan winter day.”

Sietsema said he expects the feed mill “to be in a position to replace nearly all the natu-ral gas and the majority of the electricity we currently con-

sume.”“Our system is a baseload

(generation system),” said Prouty. “It runs at full speed 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It makes full power all the time” — unlike wind and solar energy devices.

Prouty said biomass gasifi-cation has huge potential as an alternative to fossil fuel be-cause there is so much biomass available, especially in Michi-gan agriculture. The organic content of household trash and sewage can also be gasified, he noted.

“Everybody talks about wind and solar, which don’t have near as much potential as biomass,” said Prouty. He said there are “a number of quiet developers out putting deals together, all built around bio-mass. You just never hear about it.”

HTI builds biomass energy plant

THOSE INVOLVED IN the biomass gasification system proj-ect include, from left, Dave Prouty, president of Heat Transfer International, and Rick and Harley Sietsema.


Biomass just doesn’t get any respect, in the opinion of Bruce Goodman, a partner at Varnum.

Biomass — wood, grass clip-pings, corn stalks, turkey drop-pings, cow manure, landfill garbage — has energy in it and there are various ways to ex-tract it. But biomass doesn’t get nearly as much ink as wind and solar energy.

Goodman, who practices law involving environmental, energy and construction issues, said people generally don’t even think of biomass when the talk is about alternative energy.

“Talking about waste is never glamorous,” he said. Talk about turkey litter and manure digesters just doesn’t give peo-ple a warm fuzzy feeling like wind turbines spinning in the sky and solar panels soaking up the rays.

But biomass has “really leapfrogged over solar and wind energy when you consid-er the economics,” said Good-man. “Both solar and wind currently need and are receiv-

ing economic incentives. The economics for biomass, how-ever, make it economically vi-able on its own.”

G o o d m a n has been prac-ticing law since 1979 and was involved in alter-native energy projects going back to the mid-1980s. He re-ally likes biomass gasification, a process in which a bunch of biomass is essentially “cooked” without oxygen, which forces gas out of it that can then be captured and burned to gener-ate electricity or make steam.

Advances in metallurgy and engineering technology are go-ing to make biomass gasifica-tion a big splash here in West Michigan very soon, he said.

Goodman said he under-stands that a gasification fa-cility can be built to generate electricity at lower cost than wind or solar technology. Ev-erybody’s tuned in to wind turbines and solar panels, but “biomass is really going to fool people.”

Is biomass gasification an energy Cinderella story?

Goodman



T. Arnold “Arn” Boezaart, the executive director of the Grand Valley State University Michi-gan Alternative & Renewable Energy Center, is a self-de-scribed lakeshore guy.

When he moved to the area in 1972, Muskegon was “sort of near the zenith of its manufac-turing heyday. And then I rode the curve to the bottom,” along with the manufacturing base.

His first career began in 1972 with the Michigan Department of Human Services. His sec-ond career began in 1997 when he was offered a position with the Community Foundation of Muskegon County, which was interested in launching an en-vironmental program.

As vice president of grant programs at the foundation, Boezaart oversaw the acquisi-tion and installation of a small 1.5 kW Swift wind turbine on the roof of the Frauenthal Per-forming Arts Center in down-town Muskegon. The founda-

tion also set up an educational display in the Frauenthal lobby with monitors and gauges that show exactly how much elec-tricity the turbine is producing.

In early 2009, Boezaart began his third career when GVSU hired him to serve as interim di-rector of the Michigan Al-ternative &

Renewable Energy Center, or MAREC. In November 2009, GVSU named Boezaart to the post permanently.

Located on the edge of Mus-kegon Lake in the Muskegon SmartZone, MAREC opened in 2003 with a mission to serve as an educational center and a catalyst for economic devel-opment. It is a business accel-erator and center for research, development and the commer-cialization of alternative and renewable energy technologies.

Boezaart was among the founders of the Muskegon Area

Sustainability Coalition, and he still serves on the coalition’s leadership team.

“I’ve been part of the transi-tion” from a smokestack indus-trial economy to the beginnings of a cleaner one, said Boezaart.

MAREC is an educational facility where functioning de-vices demonstrate various al-ternate ways to generate power. Up to 1.8 kilowatts of electric-ity is generated by a small wind turbine; a microturbine fu-eled by natural gas generates 30 kilowatts; and photovoltaic panels on the roof generate up to 30 kilowatts in maximum sunlight. There is also a fuel cell that can generate 250 kilo-watts — more than twice as much as MAREC uses. It is kept on standby status, however, be-cause it is expensive to operate.

Researchers at MAREC also study advanced battery technology, but the big push is the feasibility of offshore wind farms. Since Boezaart started working at MAREC, he has led the search for funding with which to build a wind- and

currents-measuring platform several miles out in Lake Mich-igan.

“I’m not a scientist or re-searcher, but I do believe wind energy is in our collective fu-ture, in this country in general and in the Great Lakes region in particular,” he said.

“Wind energy is expensive, certainly, in its earliest stages” of development, he said. “And it’s generally recognized as be-ing twice as expensive to do it offshore,” he said.

“On the positive side, we also know that the winds off-shore are much more robust than they are on shore,” he said.

Muskegon Lake offers a deep water harbor next to a once-thriving industrial city, which has now been identified “as a potentially very important location for the development of the offshore wind industry that is to come,” said Boezaart.

That industry will need a lot of onshore support, he said, including manufacturing and staging areas for assembly of large turbine components.

Making the transition from smokestacks to clean energy

1607 Robinson Road, SE | Grand Rapids, MI 49506-1799 616 632-2900 or 800 678-9593 | www.aquinas.edu

There’s more than one way to a brilliant career.Find yours at Aquinas College.

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Boezaaart


Cascade Engineer-ing will build another large solar electric system – in its own backyard.


Cascade Engineering, which completed a 150-kilowatt so-lar electric generating sys-tem on the roof of the Padnos Iron & Metal recycling plant on 44th Street in March, also started construction of its own 150-kilowatt solar system.

“We’re putting our money where our mouth is,” said Mi-chael Ford, manager of Cas-cade Engineering’s Renewable Energy division. The planned system, which has been ap-proved by Consumers Energy for inclusion in its Experi-mental Advanced Renewable Program, will be at Cascade Engineering’s manufacturing complex in southeast Grand Rapids.

Like the $1.27 million sys-tem on the roof of the Padnos plant, Cascade Engineering’s solar power plant will be tied into the electrical grid and Consumers Energy will buy all the electricity produced from it for 12 years, under its EARP project. Consumers an-nounced in 2009 it would pur-chase a total of two megawatts of electricity generated by so-lar systems in Michigan, with about 75 percent of that to come from commercial-sized installations — up to 150 kilo-watts peak output — and the remainder from small solar in-stallations like those on homes.

Consumers launched the EARP project and its incen-tives as an experiment, to get solar systems tied into the grid so that the company can begin studying the reliability and other issues related to so-lar generation. Consumers is paying up to 45 cents per kilo-watt hour for electricity from commercial-sized systems, much higher than the cost of electricity generated at con-ventional fuel-burning power plants, and at least four to six times the amount Consum-

ers charges business custom-ers for the electricity they use. Residential-size systems ac-cepted in the EARP program will be paid 65 cents per kilo-watt hour.

Cascade Engineering, which assembles, sells and installs the Swift small wind turbine, also developed a solar power in-stallation capability as part of its Cascade Renewable Energy division, although it does not manufacture photovoltaic pan-els.

Jeff Padnos, president of Padnos Iron & Metal, said the company expects its system to recover its cost in about eight years. That may be considered too long to wait for payback of an investment but Padnos said they were willing to consider it because “this one has some so-cial and some goodwill advan-tages.” He noted, however, that without the incentive offered by Consumers Energy, plus federal investment tax cred-its for renewable energy, “we wouldn’t have done it.”

The actual day-to-day ex-perience of a system in use will reveal a lot of useful informa-tion, which Padnos said they intend to share “so people can compare.”

Ford said the Padnos sys-tem, which is one of, if not the largest solar installation that Consumers Energy is aware of in Michigan, “was a lightning-fast project” with installation done in two months. It was rushed because Consumers Energy quickly began receiv-ing applications for the EARP program and Cascade Engi-neering “also wanted to par-ticipate in the program, if we could.”

To people who question whether Michigan is sunny enough for efficient solar ener-gy, Ford said he points out that the largest solar energy mar-ket in the world is in Germany right now, “and the best spot in Germany, or near it, is worse” than the best area in Michigan, from a solar resource stand-point.

While Padnos is its first commercial-sized solar instal-lation, “we’ve got others in the works here in Michigan,” said Ford.

Commercial sun power blooming in Grand Rapids

Solar energy installation finds place in Wyoming.


A solar energy system capable of generating up to 150 kilo-watts of power was dedicated at the Padnos Iron & Metal Co. metal recycling plant in March. The system was installed on top of the plant at 500 44th St. SW by Cascade Engineering’s Renewable Energy division.

It is the largest installation of solar panels in Michigan, according to an announcement from Cascade Engineering, and the largest project of its kind undertaken by Cascade Renewable Energy. It compris-es 636 3-by-5-foot solar panels that cover a 15,000-square-foot area atop the recycling facility. An initial step in the project involved covering the plant roof with a 30,000-square-foot white rubber membrane for better heat reflection, a key factor in maintaining optimal system performance in all sea-sons.

“It may seem a bit coun-terintuitive to launch a solar energy project in Michigan at a time of year when additional snowfall is still a distinct pos-sibility,” said Fred P. Keller, chairman and CEO of Cascade Engineering. He said the proj-ect “illustrates both the year-round capability of today’s solar energy solutions and the real hope that renewable energy

can offer the state’s struggling economy.”

The installation is intended to achieve significant cost sav-ings and greater energy self-sufficiency for Padnos. Working with Consumers Energy, Cas-cade Renewable Energy and Padnos developed a long-range plan that taps into Consumers’ Experimental Advanced Re-newable Program, a recently launched solar energy pilot initiative. During the initial phase of Padnos’ contract with Consumers, the utility will pay preferred rates for the energy produced, offsetting the facili-ty’s energy costs. After 12 years, the power generated at the fa-cility will be connected directly to Padnos’ meter, significantly reducing the building’s use of electricity from the grid.

The cost of the installation was not revealed.

“Our new installation was facilitated by a beneficial solar incentive program, but it took a highly committed group of in-dividuals from the Cascade and Padnos teams to develop some-thing truly innovative on this scale,” said Jeff Padnos, presi-dent of Padnos Iron & Metal.

He noted that some of the aluminum used in the solar-generating system was recy-cled aluminum that had been reclaimed and processed by Padnos.

“Creating this first-of-its-size solar installation is an exciting expansion of our ex-pertise and environmental commitment, and a path we hope many other businesses will emulate,” said Padnos.

THIS SOLAR ENERGY system was installed at the Padnos Iron & Metal Co. metal recycling plant in Wyoming.

Let there be light


PioneerCONSTRUCTION

engineers scientists architects constructors

It hits full transition to 100 percent green energy.

Jake HimmelspachGrand Rapids Business Journal

In 2004, when Herman Miller Inc. was conducting its annual evaluation of its sustainability goals, instead of putting out a schedule of what it wanted to accomplish in the next three to

four years, the fi rm extended the timeline to 2020 — creating its “Perfect Vision” goals.

“It’s a continuation of our journey,” said Paul Murray, HMI director of environmental health and safety.

“In 1991, we kicked off our zero landfi ll. Everybody thought we were nuts then, but it really solidifi ed our thoughts that we can make big differ-ences if we take on big goals.”

Perfect Vision includes three goals: sustainability in its

buildings, sustainability in its products and becoming foot-print free. The latter consists of things such as zero waste, zero air emissions, zero water use and 100 percent green power.

On May 1, 2010, Herman Miller achieved the transition to 100 percent green power — fi ve years ahead of schedule.

Murray said green power comes in three forms: building onsite power generators such as windmills, buying renewable energy credits, and purchase

power agreements.“There’s three ways to get

(green power),” said Murray. “You can build it yourself — you could generate it onsite … (we) don’t have a lot of that. We have been buying and con-tinue to buy renewable energy credits.

“Renewable energy credits are a way to support a grow-ing industry, one that isn’t as mature as coal-fi red generation.

“(The third way) is have a contract where you do a pur-chase power agreement. What that amounts to is, we buy wind power from the Saginaw Bay area wind farm … and have Consumers Energy put it on to their grid, and we take it off in West Michigan.”

Murray said that even though there is a bit of a premium cost for green energy, the savings collected from other sustain-able efforts negates the cost.

“It doesn’t hurt our stock price because our savings that are audited and tracked are double … what it cost us to buy green power last year,” he said.

Herman Miller moves closer to ‘Perfect Vision’

HERMAN MILLER INC.’S GreenHouse facility, built in 1995 and LEED certifi ed.



A model wind turbine ordi-nance developed by the Ottawa County Planning Commission for use by townships won an award for Ottawa County from the National Association of Counties in Washington, D.C.

With wind turbines popping up all over the American land-scape and local officials racing to enact zoning ordinances restricting them, the Ottawa County planning commission decided to draft a model or-dinance that would take into account all sizes and types of the turbines. NACo noticed the model ordinance that was put on the Ottawa County Web site in early 2010 because it appar-ently is one of the first in the nation to provide specific zon-ing standards for small, medi-um and large turbines.

Mark Knudsen, director of planning for Ottawa County, said that “most of the ordi-nances that are being adopted at this point in time have a one-size-fits-all approach” with the largest wind turbines in mind. The effect has been ordinance language that tends to discour-age individuals and businesses from installing small and me-dium-size turbines that don’t entail nearly as many contro-versial issues.

Knudsen said the Ottawa County planning commis-sion would rather encourage renewable energy than see it discouraged by heavy-handed zoning ordinances. The coun-ty’s model ordinance has been used as a reference by several townships and municipalities in Michigan that have drafted ordinances.

“I know of four that have ad-opted ordinances that are simi-

lar to our model,” said Knud-sen: Holland, Grand Haven Township, Zeeland Township, and the city of Walker, which is in Kent County. He said he is aware of about 10 other com-munities looking at the model.

“We’ve also had calls from different states, where people had downloaded it off the In-ternet and had questions,” said Knudsen.

Knudsen said that there are really four categories of wind turbines now: The newest are the small turbines that can be

mounted on a rooftop.“The requirements for

each are unique and separate,” he said. “When we wrote the (model) ordinance, we were not able to find any model any-where in the nation that really addressed” any but the largest wind turbines.

Knudsen said in his opinion, in some cases the small tur-bines and possibly even some medium-sized machines may not even require a special use permit from the local govern-ment.

Model wind turbine rules recognized

REGULATION OF WIND turbines such as these installed on the roof of a Meijer Inc. store was the aim of a model wind turbine ordinance in Ottawa County.


Tony Quarto said he and other attorneys at Smith Haughey Rice & Roegge in Grand Rapids saw that wind-farm developers are represented by attorneys, and utility companies that buy the electricity are represented by attorneys, “but nobody was representing the landowners.”

So Quarto and Jon Siebers, another attorney from Smith Haughey, began giving free le-gal seminars on leasing land to wind-energy developers, with Quarto generally focusing on the legal ramifications of the leases and Siebers explaining state laws and local ordinances.

Quarto said a landowner should be sure the proposed contract is in his or her best interest before signing. “Oth-erwise, the horse is already out of the barn. It’s very difficult to make any changes to help the landowner,” he said.

“Although the leverage is against the landowner once the contract is signed, it’s still worth having these contracts

reviewed by an attorney to see what you’re stuck with,” added Siebers.

Quarto said he believes many landowners have signed a wind-development contract without an attorney reviewing it first, adding that the con-tracts typically are “extraordi-narily complex.”

Some of the major issues of which land-owner must be fully aware are:•What exactly will happen on the land? How much of the property can still be used for farming or some other use? Siebers noted that in addition to the actual land a turbine is situated on, the developers need access roads to the turbines and right-of-ways for the underground transmission lines.•How long will the property be tied up? When does the con-tract expire? “We’ve seen some that have no time limits,” said Quarto.

•How much will the landown-er be paid and how?•What is the landowner’s li-ability if the wind developer’s equipment injures someone or damages property? What if a neighbor files suit against the landowner, claiming the wind turbine is a nuisance? •Who is responsible for de-commissioning a meteorologi-cal tower or a turbine when it is no longer in use? Quarto said he is aware of one report indi-cating that taking down and removing a utility company-grade wind turbine can cost as much as $85,000. He said the best defense for a landowner is the posting of a removal bond by the developer, which as-sures that the landowner will not have to pay the decommis-sion cost if the development company goes out of business.

Leases for wind-farm sites go in phases, said Quarto. The first is the evaluation or option phase, which entails a sepa-rate lease usually lasting from two to five years. During that time, the developer studies the wind conditions and may erect

a meteorological tower. An op-tion lease doesn’t mean the developer is definitely going to put up wind turbines, how-ever. If the developer does de-cide to erect wind turbines on optioned property, that begins the second phase, requiring another contract for the long-term lease.

Quarto said the landowner will be paid for the option lease, “but not very much.” How much the landowner might be paid for a long-term lease is one of the great variables. Quarto said he has read that it typically ranges from $3,000 to $5,000 per year per turbine, although he has heard of one wind farm supposedly paying the landowners $8,000 per tur-bine, “but due to the confiden-tiality agreements, you have to take that with a grain of salt.”

Some contracts prepared by developers include confidenti-ality agreements that prohibit the landowner from revealing the terms of the contract with anyone. That means no shar-ing notes with the neighbor on how much he is being paid.

Law firm reviews land leases to wind-energy developers

Quarto



Metro Health Hospital is a local leader in sustainability. Toward the end of 2008, the new facil-ity received LEED certification from the U.S. Green Building Council, the first hospital in the state to receive it.

Metro Health also has cre-ated a roughly $30,000 annual savings by implementing envi-ronmentally friendly programs such as recycling. John Ebers, sustainability officer for Metro Health, oversees all of its sus-tainable programs.

“The three major areas I focus on are energy, waste and water,” he said. That means figuring out ways to be more efficient with energy consump-tion, he said, putting a greater emphasis on recycling, and finding ways to become more efficient with the consumption of water.

“To get those things done, I work with pretty much ev-ery single department in the hospital, from purchasing new

technology to figuring out ways to implement the technology or process.”

Ebers has been with Metro Health almost seven years. When he joined the organiza-tion, the concept of a sustain-ability officer was relatively new, but in his time at Metro, Ebers said he has seen such roles on the increase.

“They call it different things at different places,” he said, but added there are universal sus-tainability concepts that apply to any organization.

Benefits of using sustain-able practices show up in other ways besides the bottom line. Ebers said it has been an en-couraging force for employees, as well.

“It’s not a tangible thing in terms of the benefit, but I think I can speak for our employees and people I interact with on a day-to-day basis. They want to work for a company that is evaluating its ecological foot-print.”

Ebers said Metro Health’s sustainability efforts also have

been increasingly noticed in the community.

“People will often say, ‘It’s really cool what Metro’s doing.’ It sounds really simplistic, but the fact that somebody recog-nizes that a hospital is environ-mentally conscious — I don’t know what that’s worth, but it says something,” he said.

Keeping ‘green’ a top priority

The trademarks Hyatt®, Hyatt Hotels & Resorts®, Hyatt Place®, Hyatt Gold Passport® and related marks are trademarks of Hyatt Corporation. © 2010 Hyatt Corporation. All rights reserved.

JOHN EBERS, sustainability officer for Metro Health.


It’s been said that Grand Rap-ids, and West Michigan in gen-eral, are among the greenest of green construction regions in the U.S., but LEED stats from the U.S. Green Building Council West Michigan are impressive.

“There are 217 certified and registered (LEED) buildings in Grand Rapids,” said Linda Frey, executive director of the US-GBC West Michigan. “That’s 30 percent of Michigan’s certified and registered buildings. West Michigan actually has … almost 500. That’s 66 percent of the state’s (LEED) buildings.”

“When it comes to our standing in the nation, we are No. 8,” she added. “We’ve also got a strong ecological intel-ligence in that we have 400 LEED accredited professionals in Grand Rapids alone.”

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Michigan’s Thumb may have the state’s greatest wind en-ergy potential, but Allegan County has received attention from the state government be-cause it already has in place the high-voltage transmission lines required if commercial wind farms were built there.

The Michigan Public Ser-vice Commission has desig-nated two Michigan regions as Wind Energy Resource Zones. An area referred to as Region 4 in the Thumb region was identified as the primary zone. However, the MPSC also identified Region 1, made up of parts of seven townships in in-land Allegan County.

The commission identified the two wind energy zones based largely on the findings of the Wind Energy Resource Zone Board, which studied four potential regions for wind farms in Michigan. David Wal-ters, chair of that board, has

said that transmission would be a vital concern to develop-ers of commercial wind farms. Walters said that if the trans-mission company has existing right-of-way, and the task is to upgrade the existing transmis-sion line, “that might be at one cost.” However, if there is no existing line or right-of-way, he said, “then they would have to go out and get the right-of-way and develop that property, as well, and who knows how much that could cost?”

ITC Holdings has a basic idea of that potential cost. ITC, which now owns all the high-voltage transmission lines in the Lower Peninsula originally owned by Consumers Energy and DTE, submitted a report to the MPSC early in 2010 that stated: “Numerous generation interconnection studies have documented the fact that there is essentially no additional transmission capacity available in the Thumb area.”

Tom Vitez, vice president of Planning at ITC, served on

the WERZ board as a repre-sentative of the independent transmission companies. He said ITC estimates it would cost about $510 million to add roughly 120 miles of the high-voltage transmission capacity required if the Thumb region was to produce its maximum estimated wind farm energy potential.

The ITC report to the MPSC states that “no enhance-ments to the … transmission system would be required for (Region 1) to interconnect the minimum or maximum wind generation capacity levels.”

“We have two existing high-voltage circuits there already. So it’s essentially already there,” said Joe Kirik, a spokes-person for ITC.

Vitez said Allegan County is “at the other end of the spec-trum from the Thumb.” The Thumb has large potential capacity for wind energy but relatively weak transmission infrastructure, while Allegan has “relatively small amounts

of potential generation” and “relatively robust transmis-sion.”

Robert B. Nelson, a Lansing attorney who specializes in en-ergy and telecommunications law, said that where the wind is does make a big difference to the transmission companies, because they will ultimately be responsible for building the infrastructure to get wind-generated electricity to the customers.

“ITC will be heavily in-volved in making sure those wind projects get to market.”

Kirik said ITC is involved in a “longer range process” that would begin with determin-ing the most appropriate sites for new transmission lines. “The real estate part of it — the right-of-way — will be a signif-icant part of that, particularly if we need expanded right-of-way, which we almost certainly would.”

Transmission lines boost viability


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Spurt Industries makes recycling easy and profi table.


Spurt Industries is helping companies save thousands of dollars on their waste removal and be more earth-friendly at the same time.

A couple of years ago, “we started the SORT with Spurt program,” said Zeeland-based Spurt Industries owner Tom Turner. SORT stands for Spe-cialized Organics Recycling Team. “We go out to (compa-nies) and give them two con-tainers: one for trash and one for organic waste — paper, cardboard, food waste …” Com-panies can even include their grass clippings or brush.

By separating out the or-ganic waste and recycling it through Spurt, the savings in trash disposal adds up while also reducing the use of landfi ll

space. Metro Health Hospital uses

sthe program and has seen a two-ton reduction of solid waste on average per month.

San Chez Bistro has been using the program since spring 2008. For a restaurant that was already separating its waste, the transition wasn’t hard and, in fact, simplifi ed the process in place. Marnie Vander Weide, service manager and sustain-ability coordinator at San Chez, said roughly 90 percent of the restaurant’s waste now goes to Spurt.

The SORT with Spurt pro-gram is just part one of what Spurt Industries does. Af-ter Spurt collects the organic waste, it is readied for use in nutrient-rich soil.

“We take the organic waste and mix it with our yard waste; then we run it through a tub grinder,” he said. “Then we lay it out in wind rows, which are big long piles, and fl ip those piles several times over a six- to eight-month period.

“Then we put it through a

screening plant and we make fi nished compost out of that, which could be blends or straight compost,” he said. “We sell that to the open market, whether that’s retail centers, landscapers, commercial jobs or rain garden mixes.”

“Around here soil is typi-cally clay-based or sand-based, and at best, if it’s really black, might have 2 to 3 percent or-ganic matter. Our top soil that has compost in it will have as much as 8 to 10 percent organic

matter,” said Turner. Spurt Industries has had a

bit of a growth spurt of its own. Since 2008, the company has opened locations in Ada and Byron Center. The company also opened a location in Wix-om, northwest of Detroit, and has looked for another site in the Detroit area.

Information on the SORT with Spurt program can be found at www.sortwithspurt.com; www.spurtindustries.com is the general company site.

Turning waste into clean dirt

SPURT INDUSTRIES OWNER Tom Turner initiated SORT, which stands for Specialized Organics Recycling Team.



The first generation of lithi-um-ion battery production for electric vehicles in the U.S. has been facilitated by the federal government’s stimulus pro-gram, and a significant amount of that investment landed in West Michigan. However, the

location of the “future home of the second g e n e ra t i o n ” of electric ve-hicle batteries is still wide open, accord-ing to Ann Marie Sastry, a University of Michigan

engineering professor known for her automotive battery re-search.

Sastry spoke in Holland at the invitation of Lakeshore Advantage, which played a ma-jor role in attracting LG Chem to Holland, where it broke ground this summer on a $303 million plant for production of lithium-ion cells for recharge-able battery packs in electric vehicles. The Korean company already has sales agreements in place with General Motors and Hyundai-Kia. President Barack Obama was on hand for the LG Chem groundbreaking event. He used the occasion to tout the administration’s ad-vocacy for U.S. electric vehicle production.

The LG Chem plant will be less than two miles from the Johnson Controls-Saft plant that was preparing to begin production this summer of battery packs that will go into hybrid-electric vehicles made by Ford Motor Co. A little over an hour’s drive to the south-east, Toda America Inc., a subsidiary of a Japanese com-pany, was granted a tax break in March from the Michigan Economic Development Corp. in return for investing $70 mil-lion in a Battle Creek manufac-turing site that will produce cathode materials for lithium electric vehicle batteries.

In Muskegon Township, about a half-hour’s drive north from Holland, the Michigan Economic Growth Authority has approved a state tax credit worth more than $12.6 million

over 10 years for fortu Power-Cell GmbH, a German-Swiss company that plans to research and develop lithium-ion elec-tric vehicle batteries near the Bayer Crop Science facil-ity. Fortu PowerCell will invest about $623 million at the site, which will create more than 700 jobs in the years to come, according to state economic development officials. Ed Gar-ner, president and CEO of the Muskegon Area First economic development agency, said fortu PowerCell probably will break ground in 2011. It has been ap-proved for a battery cell manu-facturing tax credit of $100 million over four years, ac-cording to the MEDC.

In the case of Johnson Controls-Saft and LG Chem, the compa-nies received federal grants matching their own multi-million dollar in-vestments, under the 2009 American Recovery and Rein-vestment Act. The Obama ad-ministration announced in Au-gust 2008 that $2.4 billion was being made available in ARRA funds to stimulate the develop-ment of plug-in cars and the infrastructure required to keep them charged. About $1.5 bil-lion of that was earmarked for U.S.-based manufacturers to produce batteries and compo-nents.

Randy Thelen, president of Lakeshore Advantage, said nu-

merous stud-ies showed that the elec-tric vehicle industry was not taking off in the U.S. “because we did not have the battery technology to support it.”

That led to the government’s plan to “jump start that indus-try,” he said.

Of the $1.5 billion for bat-tery and component produc-tion, the largest single grant — about $299 million — went to Johnson Controls and its French partner Saft for the Holland plant. The grant to

LG Chem was the fourth larg-est of its type at $151 million. The two grants together equal about 30 percent of the total ARRA stimulus funds for bat-tery production in the U.S.

“Nowhere else in the coun-try are you going to see that much concentrated invest-ment in a new technology, a new industry with tremendous growth potential,” said Thelen. “When you talk about projects with a big economic impact, I’m not sure it gets bigger than this.”

Thelen said Johnson Con-trols-Saft and LG Chem are “pretty strong competitors” and that LG Chem decided to locate in Holland after JC-S did for a number of reasons. He said LG Chem studied the labor force, the infrastruc-ture and other attributes of the community. Electricity for industry is available from the Holland Board of Public Works generating plant “at rates well below statewide averages,” noted Thelen.

Toda America Inc., which manufactures iron oxide and mixed metal particles used in rechargeable lithium-ion bat-teries, could intend to become a supplier to the battery in-dustry in West Michigan. Toda came into the region as a direct result of JC-S and LG Chem being here, said Thelen.

Ann Marie Sastry is CEO of Sakti3, in addition to being an engineering faculty member at the University of Michigan. Sakti3 was launched three years ago to research and de-velop solid-state lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, providing more power at less cost, and General Motors is now one of several organiza-tions that have entered into a partnership with the firm.

There is “huge opportu-nity” in the U.S. for electric vehicle production if they can be built cheaply enough, Sastry told the audience in Holland in late March. She noted that the “new middle class” on the rise in Asia, Russia and Latin America will “dwarf” the U.S. middle class in the market it represents for new vehicles – including electric hybrids.

Sastry said the GM Volt hy-brid-electric car being readied for production theoretically carries a battery pack twice as

large as what it actually needs. That’s because discharging a battery pack too low or re-charging it too high reduces the life of those battery cells, so the Volt must be recharged when still carrying a 50 per-cent charge. Carrying the dead weight of unused battery ca-pacity adds inefficiency so more research is urgent.

Sastry said there is a race among nations to develop elec-tric or hybrid-electric vehicles. European and Asian research-ers got the jump on the U.S. auto industry, but she said that “some of the best people on earth at getting the cost out of the manufacturing process” are in Michigan.

Public opinion matters in the economic race to develop a practical electric-drive ve-hicle, she said. For example, although both presidential candidates in 2008 addressed climate change from pollution as a legitimate concern, a sur-vey shows that 60 percent of Americans don’t think climate change will affect them in their lifetime.

She also noted that collabo-ration between government and the R&D sector makes a difference, when you compare how large a role the U.S. gov-ernment actually plays com-pared to other countries.

“China is outspending us 20 to one,” she said.

Sastry was asked if there is any risk that lithium-ion bat-tery technology for cars might turn out to be obsolete, despite all the money being invested in it in the U.S. “Yes,” she replied, without hesitation.

How much? she was asked. “Huge,” she said, eliciting laughter among the audience.

She briefly described some of the alternative materials being explored but noted that the auto industry here has to try despite the risks. “You can’t not be in the game,” she said, reminding the audience that battery technology grew in Asia because U.S. automakers weren’t interested when it first came up years ago.

She said her Ann Arbor company planned to ship its first prototype batteries in late 2010.

Electric car battery production looms large

Garner

Thelen

Sastry


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special report: innovation & sustainability - 2010

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