♪♪

>> Lead funding for

"Peril and Promise"

is provided by

Dr. P. Roy Vagelos and

Diana T. Vagelos.

Major support is provided

by the Marc Haas Foundation

and Sue and

Edgar Wachenheim III.

>> Hello, and thanks

for joining us.

I'm Jim Paymar with the

"Long Island Business Report."

The federal government has

scaled back environmental rules

and regulations

that would decrease

the amount of greenhouse gases

we emit into our atmosphere.

America is now the only nation

in the world that is not part

of the Paris Climate Accord

since President Trump

opted out of the pact,

so reducing our carbon footprint

across the country

is falling on the shoulders of

states, municipalities

and you and me.

The question becomes,

what can each

and every one of us

to do reduce energy

use and greenhouse gases?

As part of our ongoing series

of reports, "Peril and Promise:

The Challenge

of Climate Change,"

we're taking a look

at the energy picture

here on Long Island.

Here to discuss the issue

is Michael Voltz,

Director of Energy Efficiency

and Renewables at PSEG

Long Island, and Lou Rizzo,

manager of New York state's

residential energy-efficiency

programs at National Grid.

Michael and Lou, thank you both

for being here today.

I really appreciate it.

>> At peace.

>> Thank you for having us here.

>> So I'm wondering,

back to that basic premise

of what individuals can do

to reduce

our own carbon footprint,

stop emitting greenhouse gases

into the atmosphere,

what can we do personally,

in our homes, in our businesses?

>> So there's a lot of things

individuals can do.

First thing I would recommend,

have a home-energy audit done.

We can send a technician

into your home,

review attic insulation,

your wall insulation,

look at your appliances.

If you're going to upgrade

appliances, looking at an Energy

Star label on your appliances,

Energy Star appliances

tend to be more efficient

and therefore use less energy,

and certainly

with regard to lighting,

if you have any old incandescent

bulbs in your home,

you should upgrade them to LED

lights because the LED lights

are much more energy-efficient,

and they fully dimmable,

and they last a long time,

so it'd be a good investment

to change your lights as well.

>> Okay, so, Michael,

you're the electric guy.

We're going to

turn to the gas guy.

Lou, from a gas perspective,

what do we do?

We got furnaces.

We've got air-conditioning that

doesn't necessary run on gas,

but we have hot-water heaters,

stoves, grills.

>> We have a number of different

programs as well

as available for our customers,

residential, commercial

and multifamily customers.

We have for incentives

for heating equipment,

water heating.

We do insulation, so we have

the gamut of different offerings

that help our customers.

We also have a number

of low-income programs

that can help customers

that we do

for low income, so forth.

Then we do direct-install-type

measures too for businesses

and multifamily homes,

so there are a number

of different measures

that people can do

within their home

just to make it more efficient

to reduce their heating load

and to also make the house

more comfortable.

>> Okay, but this --

There's a cost attached to this,

Michael, right?

I mean, when you start to

retrofit systems,

it costs you money,

so what if people

can't afford to do this?

Are there programs out there

that help you, low-cost loans?

>> Well, we do have some

rebates available for customers,

so for example, the LED lights

that I mentioned before,

maybe if it normally would cost

$3,

we would work through our local

retailers to buy that price

down to $2 for a lamp,

and the beauty of the LED lamps

that I mentioned is,

you save enough energy

to pay for that investment

within the first two years,

and for commercial

businesses in particular,

if a business has a whole office

building, let's say,

with many, many fluorescent

fixtures and you replace

all those fluorescent tubes

with LED

in a commercial business,

again, one to two years,

and the money is paid back.

So while there is

an out-of-pocket expense,

within two years,

you get your money back,

and then, for 10 years

thereafter,

you're actually saving money,

so it's an investment,

but you can really save money

and get a good return

on your investment

if you're in business and you're

making investments

in energy efficiency.

>> And, Lou, from your

perspective,

National Grid, what do you do?

How do people operate

so that they can save money

and do some of the retrofits

that need to be done?

>> Well, we have a number

of different incentive programs

as well too that can offer

customers

to help reduce the incremental

cost when they're putting in,

let's say, new heating systems.

We also have a new store we're

going to be opening up in May.

Mid-May, we're going to be

opening an online market

where people can purchase

products online

at a discounted rate.

Also too, some of them will get

instant

rebates on some of the products,

so there's a number of different

channels for customers

to come to us to get incentives

on various

products that we offer.

And also too, a lot of the

incentives

that we offer help to reduce

a lot of the incremental costs,

especially when they're --

Either when they're converting,

there's incentives

as well for those customers,

so the cost may not be as high

as what you would think

because once you start adding on

the incentives that we have

as a utilities as far

as energy-efficient programs --

Convergent customers,

they're looking to convert.

There's discounted equipment

programs.

Once you combine

all those together,

the cost brings down

quite significantly and also

makes the home more efficient.

>> So what would you buy

at the online store?

What's it going to look like?

Give me a vision.

>> Well, the online store,

the great thing is,

we just recently

launched it in Upstate New York,

and now we're launching it

in the Long Island area

within this month,

and it's going to have products

such as Nest thermostats,

ecobee --

>> What, Nest?

>> Nest thermostats.

>> What are those?

>> Those are programmable

thermostats.

Those are great.

Those are small learning

programmable thermostats

that people are putting

in their home.

>> Uh-huh.

>> So it helps them

to understand as far as --

It's a learning thermostat.

So when you go into the home,

you set a certain temperature,

and it learns your behaviors as

far as when you're in the room,

what temperatures you want it,

and when you're not there,

it lowers down the temperatures

so you save some money.

We have seen some really

good savings for customers

when they install those type

of small learning thermostats,

and the great thing too is you

can also control a lot

of those devices via your phone,

especially smartphones.

Everyone has those,

so you can use --

>> So you have an app

that you can --

>> You have an app.

You can download the app,

and you can control it.

You can reduce your heat,

especially when you're not home.

Let's say if you have a pet

at home, you want to just

keep the room a little warmer.

You can just bring it up

a couple points

just to keep it nice and warm

because you don't want the dogs

to get cold.

>> Oh, we certainly

wouldn't want that.

>> Yeah.

>> Exactly, exactly, but,

you know,

people love their pets,

and it's always great

to keep them warm.

>> What about things like Alexa?

>> Yes.

>> Is that in our future

where we can --

>> We are looking

at on a pilot basis.

We don't have anything right now

for Alexa.

We do have a --

I want to just back up.

We also have an online

marketplace, and the beauty

of the Nest thermostats

or the smart learning

thermostats is they work

for both your heating system,

which could be natural gas

or fuel oil,

but also your air-conditioning

system in the summertime.

>> Uh-huh, right.

>> So we also have incentives we

provide

through our online marketplace.

You can get a $50

discount right now

if you buy one of those smart

learning thermostats.

With regard to Alexa,

we're piloting

and trying to demonstrate

that there's a capability

through Alexa to control

various appliances in the home

and become

more efficient that way,

but we haven't rolled it out

in full scale at this time.

>> What about solar panels

on your roof?

>> Yes.

>> I've seen that, you know,

all over Long Island

but not a lot of it.

Do you have programs that

people can participate in...

>> Right.

>> ...get it put on the roof?

>> Yeah.

>> When does it pay itself off?

>> Yeah, we do.

So right now, there's 40,000,

approximately,

40,000 homes on Long Island

that have solar PV,

which is just about 4%

of the total homes

on Long Island, so it is

becoming more significant.

The savings

on the electric bill,

if you put in a solar system,

typically the system

is designed to offset

your entire electric bill,

so you get, instead of

the typical monthly bill,

you would get it down to maybe

less than $10 a month or so

just for the base charges

for your electric bill.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> The payback period

depends upon how well your home

is situated

with regard to trees,

shade trees and the orientation.

>> Right.

>> But if your home is facing

south or southwest

where you're getting good sun

without a lot of shade trees

and you make the investment,

there's a 30% investment

tax credit

from the federal government

right now and a $5,000

New York state tax credit,

up to $5,000.

And after taking into

consideration

those tax credits

and the net metering benefit,

which basically means that

you get full retail price

for any energy that you produce,

whether you consume it

in the home

or whether you export some of it

to us at PSEG,

when you take

all that into account,

the typical payback would be

about 5 to 8 years.

So it is a big investment

for someone to consider

putting solar on their roof, but

it's great for the environment,

and it does help

reduce their electric bill.

>> I see.

Lou, I think when we talked

on the phone, I mentioned

that one of the first things

I did when I bought my home

on Long Island

was remove the oil furnace

and put in a gas furnace,

and I'm looking

at the gas picture

of the United States,

and we are now

an exporter of gas.

>> Correct.

>> We're building liquid,

natural-gasified plants

and shipping this overseas,

so shouldn't my bill

be going down?

>> Well, depending

on how insulated your home

is currently right now,

especially when

there's drafty windows,

so you can put the best

heating system in the home,

but if the house is very drafty,

the costs

are always going to be high,

so it's always good to caulk

around the windows.

Do some easy tips to help

to reduce

your bills quite significantly.

There's also too --

You can do --

Let's say if you have your vents

that are going

through the house.

If you wrap the vents that are

especially

in unconditioned areas

where you're not normally there,

so I see in the basement

that you don't normally use.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> You maintain the heat there,

so as long as you're insulating

the pipes or the vents,

it prevents

the heat loss from those,

and it goes to the areas

that you really need

that'll heat up the home itself.

So it's just -- Doing the minor

small, little things within

the home will help to reduce

a lot of the heat costs

that you currently have,

especially if there's

any kind of increases.

>> Right, but the price of gas,

I mean, it has gone down,

hasn't it?

>> It's gone pretty stable.

So the price of gas

is staying --

It's relatively been low

because there's an abundance

amount of supply

right now of natural gas

in the region, and it's also --

The forecast is,

look like there's going to be

an abundance amount for the next

10 years or more because

it's a good natural resource.

It's a commodity,

and it's also a very clean fuel

too at the burn.

>> It's much cleaner than oil,

isn't it?

>> Definitely, 100%, yes.

>> Okay, and, Michael,

what other programs do you have?

What else do we see

on the horizon?

What's the future look like

when you guys sit around

in the room and think about,

"Well, you know, we've got to

provide so much electric power

to so many people,

but we want to reduce our carbon

footprint"?

What can be done?

>> So a couple things

that we see on the horizon

in the future, we talked about

the smart thermostats already,

which is a great way to control

your energy use in your home for

air-conditioning and heating.

Even electric vehicles now

are becoming much more popular.

>> Uh-huh.

>> So gasoline,

internal-combustion engines

on cars are basically

not the cleanest way to --

It's a effective way

to transport,

but it's not the cleanest way.

And electric vehicles

are becoming much more popular.

There's now about 10,000

electric vehicles

on Long Island.

We expect that number to grow

significantly,

and it's much cleaner

to burn natural gas

in a power plant

or renewable solar power plants,

et cetera,

and then put that electricity

in a battery and store

the energy in the battery,

and you can drive your electric

vehicle, also battery storage

for purposes

of just changing the time

at which you use your energy,

so if you have a commercial

building

with the battery-storage

technology in their building,

they can use less energy

during the daytime

on peak and store

some of that energy at night,

so that's

another efficient technology.

>> So use Lou's gas...

>> Right, right.

>> ...to produce power...

>> Yes.

>> ...so that you can

power your car?

>> Right, and the beauty

of electric vehicles is,

you can charge them at night,

so it costs us a lot of money,

us as a utility,

to build the infrastructure

to meet the peak demand

on a hot summer afternoon.

>> Right.

>> And with electric vehicles,

you can use all that energy

at night to charge the vehicle,

so it's an off-peak consumption

of energy, which is an efficient

way to use the electric grid.

>> Yeah.

Even with electric

cars nowadays, there's --

You can program a time

of the day that you actually

want them to charge.

>> Right.

>> So you can plug them in.

>> Oh, wow.

>> And then let's say,

4:00 in the morning,

you want it to charge

for, like, 3, 4 hours at a time.

The system would automatically

allow you to do it.

We're also actually doing

an initiative,

a pilot, in Upstate New York

looking at electric vehicles

as well.

>> What about charging stations?

I don't see many of them

in New York.

Occasionally in a parking lot,

you'll see one or two.

>> So yeah.

We just provided a very large

incentive to Canon USA,

right down the road

from your studio.

>> Uh-huh.

>> They put in 20 charging ports

for their employees.

>> Oh, I see.

>> And we've provided

an incentive

for business customers.

We don't do it yet for

homeowners,

although we're contemplating it,

but if a business customer

wants to put in a charging

station for their employees

that drive electric vehicles,

we now give a $4,000 incentive

for each charging station

that they install,

so we are

rolling that program out.

We recently paid some incentives

on that.

>> Didn't I hear that you can

take the battery

and once it reaches

its peak charge,

and let's say you have

more than one battery...

>> Right.

>> ...can you sell

that electricity

back to the utility?

>> It's possible to do that.

You would have to have an

agreement with us as a utility,

an interconnection agreement.

For the safety of our employees,

we can't have electricity

just flowing back into our grid

without being aware of it.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> So we'd have to have an

agreement, so it's not done yet,

but in theory, you're right.

If you owned an electric vehicle

and you had a surplus

amount of battery storage

and you didn't really need

all of it to drive to work,

you could conceivably discharge

that vehicle

and sell it to the utility,

but we're not doing

that currently.

>> Not yet, okay.

>> No.

>> Lou, what else is going on

at National Grid

that we can think about in terms

of reducing our energy

or our carbon footprint

or just becoming more efficient?

I mean, insulation,

you mentioned that a moment ago.

I mean, I go up into

my attic, and my nails

are all frozen in the winter

because it's not insulated.

I mean, is that costing me

a lot of money?

>> It's costing you a lot

of money because

you have a lot of heat loss,

and it's basically permeating

through the roof and going out.

So if -- When you insulate

the home,

you make a tighter envelope,

and you actually save

a lot of money

as far as heating costs

because you don't have

to heat the house as often.

So let's say if you set it.

A couple of things that you

could probably do

with your heating unit,

you can add boiler-reset

controls,

which will help to lower

the firing

temperature of the unit.

Instead of firing, let's say,

the maximum temperature

180 degrees,

heating up the hot water,

circulate in the house,

it drops down the temperature,

especially during the shoulder

months when you don't need

a lot of heat, to, like,

let's say 160, 150 degrees

and allows it to heat up.

You can also put in

what they call condensing-type

units, condensing boilers.

That way, they fire at a lower

temperature,

and they save quite a bit,

and the efficiencies go up

to, like, 95%, 98%.

One of the similar things

that we're doing as a company

for customers, we're also

doing a number of pilots.

We're doing a geothermal pilot.

We partner with PSEG

Long Island to do --

In Riverhead,

we have 10 homes in Riverhead

that we're doing geothermals.

We're doing a community

geothermal initiative.

>> Tell me about that.

What is that all about,

geothermal?

How does that work?

>> It's a great technology where

you're using the ground source

because that's

at a steady temperature,

so you're circulating

water through the ground source

at a certain temperature,

and it brings it back

at a warmer temperature

in some cases.

>> I see.

>> So it allows --

We need less heat

to really generate,

and it heats up the home.

>> And if that's successful,

are you going to expand that?

Is that the idea?

>> That's the idea.

So we're actually --

We did an initial pilot

in Riverhead, Long Island,

partnering with PSEG

Long Island, and it actually

worked out very well.

We're also going to be doing a

few initiatives

in Upstate New York,

and we're looking to upscale

that initiative

depending on the success of it.

>> How is it working?

>> It's working out very well.

We initially just did --

We looked at some of the initial

results this heating season,

and the customers were very

comfortable because there

was always that assumption,

"Are they actually going to be

comfortable

with this type of system?"

Even with the cold spells

that we're had,

it's been no complaints

as far as with the system,

and people have been very

comfortable

and liking what the results are.

>> So if it does prove to

be effective and efficient,

I mean, how fast

could you roll it out?

Because I'd love to have that.

>> Yeah.

It's a expensive technology,

generally speaking...

>> It is.

>> ...because of the well

drilling and the --

But it's also very highly

efficient, and it's quiet,

so it's not for everyone,

but for homes

in new construction

or homes that may heat with oil,

and oil is more expensive than,

you know, electricity

and natural gas for heating,

so there are --

About 300 systems a year

are going in right now

on Long Island,

so it's not as popular

as some other heating systems,

but for those 300 homeowners,

they're getting a good,

very energy-efficient system.

>> Let me ask you this.

I broached it in the lead-in

of the show, which is that,

you know, it's kind of falling

on our shoulders

these days to do whatever

we can as individuals

to reduce our energy output,

but what are towns

and municipalities,

what are governmental agencies

doing to assist

both the homeowner

and work with the utilities

to reduce our carbon footprint?

>> Yeah, so a couple things.

Some of the towns worked

with us a few years ago

on a uniform solar code

to make it easier for solar

contractors to get permitted

to install solar PV on a roof,

so they made a standard code,

which made it easier

to get permitted,

so that was very beneficial,

and that was what was partly

helpful in getting so many solar

systems installed on

Long Island.

And I know Suffolk County

has been a very strong

advocate of their own buildings.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> They put solar on

many of their roofs.

They've had combined heat

and power systems going in,

which is an efficient

technology, changing all of

their lights to LED,

so they've been a big partner

of ours in working with us,

and we provide Suffolk County

with rebates for these things,

but they have a team

of individuals

that are dedicated

to making sure that their own

buildings are efficient,

so they're setting an example

for other

residents in the community.

>> I see, and, Lou, what do you

see from National Grid's

point of view?

>> Well, we've been working with

a lot of different townships,

especially with

the schools in Long Island.

We've actually been able to

provide energy-efficient centers

for all the schools

pretty much in Long Island.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> We've actually done a number

of direct-install measures

to reduce their water costs

as well as their heating cost.

We're also putting incentives

on, and assisted them with,

installing new

boilers and heating equipment,

so the cost to operate

these schools have been reduced

quite significantly

for a lot of the townships,

and we're also working

with a lot of different

town legislators

to see what we can do

to help them along to push it

to different townships

to promote energy efficiency

and to make

more towns more greener.

>> How about -- You know,

sometimes you walk

into certain offices,

and the lights go on in a room.

>> Right.

>> And they go off,

you know, a few minutes later.

I mean, that seems --

>> It's a very efficient

technology.

It's an occupancy controller,

so they motion-sense,

so occupancy controllers

on lighting are very efficient.

Also, I mentioned on towns and

municipalities,

many of them are now converting

street lights to LED lights,

which are more efficient

than the old sodium vapor

or metal halide,

the orange-colored

lights, or the sodium vapor.

>> They're blinding, though.

>> They're -- Wait.

Well, if you have a cutoff --

If they're designed properly,

the light should shine

straight down,

but you do have to be careful

not to shine in someone's eyes.

>> Uh-huh.

>> But the LED is a white light,

and it can be shined down,

and it's very

energy-efficient as well.

Along with the occupancy

controllers that you mentioned,

if it's indoors

when you go into a room,

that's a great way to control

the lighting output.

>> You know, one thing

I was curious about,

and I think I broached this

with both of you guys,

is that, you know,

you're in the business

of providing electricity

and gas,

and so you have to make a profit

for shareholders,

and so if we're using less

energy, how do you guys

stay in business?

If, overall,

over a long period of time,

if we were to cut our use by

20%, 30%, 50%, let's say,

how would that impact

your companies?

>> I'll speak for PSEG

Long Island.

>> Okay.

>> We actually have a contract

with the Long Island

Power Authority.

They own all the assets.

They own the wires and the

substations,

and we have a long-term contract

to operate the electric grid

on behalf

of Long Island Power Authority,

so we don't make any more

or less money

based on the amount

of sales of electricity.

>> Mm-hmm.

>> We make money based upon

providing great service

to our customers,

reliable service

and serving our Long Island

Power Authority,

so ultimately reducing demand

on the system while being good

for customers is also good --

The Power Authority doesn't need

as much capital or loan --

They don't have to borrow as

much money to invest

in the infrastructure,

so if we can reduce

particularly peak-demand time

in the summer months,

if we can help

the Long Island Power Authority

reduce

the peak demand on their system,

they don't need as much capital

and new substations,

new power plants,

so it's really a win-win

by promoting energy efficiency

and renewables.

>> And, Lou, same situation?

>> Same thing, situation,

with the gas utilities

where we're looking to reduce

the peak demand

in the wintertime.

So as we're promoting energy

efficiency,

it helps lower that peak

demand for us,

and it does put

less constraints on the system,

so it does have a really good,

beneficial effect

as far as the overall system

and the integrity of it,

and as a utility, we're also

always looking to look at

what the utility

of the future is going to be,

and as a corporation,

we're always actively changing

and developing to go

to the next phase in life.

>> Biggest, you know,

cost to most companies

is manpower, and I know that,

a few years ago,

I used to have a meter

in my home.

Now it's outside my home.

What about controlling

the mechanization

of our heating units

from, like, a central location

like the cable companies do?

>> Right.

>> They can check your modem,

and they can check how much,

you know, gas

or electricity you're using.

Is that...?

>> That's actually

a great lead-in.

We're finally in what we call

our Utility 2.0 plan,

but it's utility of the future,

and in that plant,

over the next 4 years,

we want to have AMI, automated

metering infrastructure.

Right now, we have about 75,000

meters on Long Island

that we can read remotely.

We built the wireless

communication system

throughout Long Island so

we can read any meter

in any location on Long Island

once we install the meters,

and over the next four years,

we're going to replace

all the meters,

so that will improve

the efficiency and the accuracy

of our meter reading

and the labor

costs that you mentioned.

We will have lower labor costs

because we'll have

a more efficient system

of reading the meters.

>> Right.

>> But maybe more importantly,

individual homeowners

can now see

their usage consumption.

Instead of getting a bill once

at

the end of the month and saying,

"Here's how much energy I used,"

you can see your usage

every 15 minutes.

So you could actually see

on a Saturday morning.

If you wake up and you start

using a lot of appliances,

you can see

the spike in your consumption,

and through learning

and behavior changes,

it'll help you save energy,

so the AMI metering

infrastructure

is also an efficient technology

because it educates consumers.

>> So if you see

how much energy you're using,

does it correlate to a cost

factor, like, if you use...

I don't know what --

>> Yeah, it's per

kilowatt-hours, so if you use

more kilowatt-hours,

right now, the pricing

is fixed per kilowatt-hour.

We are looking also at having

off-peak rates

when it's lower at night,

but the metering infrastructure

and the ability

through our website, PSEG

Long Island, psegliny.com,

but through our website,

consumers

who have this new meter,

they can go on their account,

and they can see for every 15

minutes

how much energy they used.

So if the air-conditioning

kicks on or

if the hair dryer goes on,

and we think that's a beneficial

technology for our customers.

>> And, Lou, do you have

the same kind of features

coming onboard?

>> Yes.

We are actually deploying

similar-type systems,

and we've actually been --

quite a bit discussions together

as far as rolling out

those initiatives as far as

for the gas and electric end

because we're doing a number

of pilots in Upstate as well

as in the Long Island area

and deploying AMR devices

in the New York area.

>> And what about companies?

You mentioned

Canon not too long ago.

What can companies do?

And especially, you know,

when I fly over Long Island,

you see all these buildings

with these massive roofs

that are painted black

that soak in sun.

Are there programs to, like,

paint them white

so that they reflect the sun

or put solar arrays

on top of these buildings?

>> Yeah.

So I serve on the board

of the Hauppauge Industrial

Association of Long Island,

HIA Long Island,

which is the second-largest

industrial park in the country

after Silicon Valley.

>> Is it really?

>> Yeah, it is,

50,000 or so employees

in the Hauppauge

Industrial Park, but

we are looking at putting solar.

There's about 39 buildings

that already have solar in

the Hauppauge Industrial Park.

As you said, these are big

flat-roof buildings primarily.

>> Right.

>> There's 39 buildings,

but there's 350 buildings total,

so only about 10 percent of

those buildings now have solar,

so we're looking at trying

to encourage business owners

in the park to install solar

and the white roofs as well,

which we have incentives for.

>> And, Lou, how do you get

companies to cooperate,

collaborate

and introduce new systems?

>> Well, the good thing is,

we've been working

with a lot of companies.

Canon, specifically, we've been

working with them too as well.

They built a new flagship

facility in Long Island,

and we actually work with them

to provide incentives

to make them put

more high-efficiency equipment,

so they actually did

extra insulation in the roofs,

so based on our incentives,

helped the incremental cost

as far as reduce the --

going from,

let's say, a standard-type roof

to a more efficient one.

We have -- A lot of the

incentives

that we have, we're working with

a lot of individual businesses,

so we have programs for the

small businesses

as well as the large

commercial-industrial-type

companies,

and we've been working from

laundromats to McDonald's

and Burger Kings

on helping them to reduce

a lot of their energy usage

because that's a big part

of their business.

Their energy cost is very high,

so having those incentives

available

or us partnering with them,

working with them,

identifying ways that they can

reduce those energy costs

has helped them out

significantly to reduce

the operating of that business

and also helping to reinvest

that funds into other projects

that they can do to help grow

their business even further.

>> Do you see a time where there

is a systematic approach

to constructing new energy

resources

across Long Island

that will save us money

and reduce greenhouse effects,

everything from, you know,

contractors getting together

and governments getting together

and the utilities

getting together?

>> I certainly think it is,

and not just photovoltaics,

but geothermal heat pumps

that we mentioned,

greater uses of insulation,

smart thermostats,

lighting controls,

smart appliances that you can

communicate with your smartphone

so if you want to turn off your

dishwasher at a certain time,

electric vehicles in the garage.

So I think the interconnectivity

of all the various appliances

in your home

and your electric vehicle

and the efficient construction

practices, I think,

certainly are going to continue,

and we're excited about the

future of the energy business.

I think there's a lot of new

technologies, and

PSEG Long Island is excited to

help our customers save energy.

>> So despite the fact

that maybe we're not

getting as much assistance from

the federal government in terms

of reducing greenhouse gases,

there are a lot of things

that we,

as individuals and companies,

can do to do that?

>> Yeah, absolutely.

>> With our partnership,

we've been partnering together

for many different initiatives

together,

and the customers have really

benefited from all our programs,

and the amount of usage

that they've had actually

has gone down significantly.

I think if we look at

from the start

of some of our energy-efficiency

programs to now,

we've saved the customer a total

of about 18 million therms

in total, so they're dropping

now quite significantly.

>> Eighteen million therms

would be how many dollars?

>> Oh, a dollar a therm, you

look at $18 million in total.

>> Oh, really?

>> Yeah.

>> Okay, so we're talking about

some big-bucks savings and...

>> Yeah, and certainly

on electricity as well.

>> ...reducing our carbon

footprint?

>> Yes.

So our programs save customers

a little bit over 1%

of total consumption

on Long Island.

Each year,

we save about 1%,

so what would otherwise be

a slightly growing economy

and growing consumption

is actually decreasing as well

because of the efficient

appliances

and new lighting technologies

and other control systems.

>> So the future of energy

looks bright on Long Island,

and we're reducing our

greenhouse gases

and saving ourselves

money at the same time.

>> Yes.

>> Absolutely.

>> All right.

Well, thank you so much, Michael

and Lou, for being with us,

and that wraps up

our conversation about energy

conservation on Long Island.

To learn more about

"Peril and Promise,"

please visit

perilandpromise.org,

and for more on the "Long Island

Business Report,"

log onto our website.

You can also find us

on Facebook, and join

the conversation on Twitter.

I'm Jim Paymar.

Thank you for joining us

for this edition of the

"Long Island Business Report,"

and we'll see you next time.

>> Lead funding for

"Peril and Promise"

is provided by

Dr. P. Roy Vagelos and

Diana T. Vagelos.

Major support is provided by the

Marc Haas Foundation and Sue and

Edgar Wachenheim III.

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