Efficiency called best strategy for Utah's energy future

MIDWAY — Utah electricity producers should work harder to reduce energy waste and target the state's various renewable energy resources to mitigate climate change and secure our energy future, a local energy executive said Tuesday.

"Efficiency is far and away the easiest and cheapest" strategy to reduce carbon emissions, along with better use of renewable energy sources, Doug Hunter, Utah Associated Municipal Power Systems general manager, told the Deseret News.

Speaking at the UAMPS annual member conference, Hunter said, "We shouldn't be wasting anything, and the cost (of increased efficiency) is very, very low."

UAMPS is a nonprofit agency that provides wholesale electricity to 52 community-owned power systems throughout the West, including in Utah, Arizona, California, Idaho, Nevada, New Mexico, Oregon and Wyoming.

Hunter said one of the challenges of using "renewables" is their intermittent reliability. "They only run when they run; you can't control them," he said.

To create a balance of renewable and baseload power, producers should explore mixes of natural gas and some coal, along with wind energy, he added.

He said using natural gas for electricity has the advantage of producing two-thirds less carbon dioxide than coal and it is relatively inexpensive as well as abundant in the mountain West region.

Another benefit is that natural gas is currently exempted from federal carbon regulations, reducing the "risk profile" for energy producers, he noted. He described the risk profile as the potential financial cost related to producing energy from a specific source, such as natural gas, coal or geothermal. Sources with cost volatility or increased carbon emissions are considered higher-risk.

"It's an interesting scenario that we could look at clean, efficient coal … and electrifying (automobiles), that we could get a net reduction in carbon dioxide," Hunter said.

The United States could, with minimal disruption to its infrastructure, proceed on a path that would enhance its energy security while reducing the carbon footprint from nearly all sectors, Bruce Rising with Siemens Power Generation strategic business management said during his featured presentation.

He said that the key to making progress involves optimizing efficiencies in each sector.

"For power generation, that could be achieved by major infrastructure upgrades that would be optimized by using advanced storage features … getting more kilowatt per unit of fuel," he said.