PUC takes first steps toward formal policy on combined heat and power
The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission is looking to fire up the market for combined heat and power, the technology that gets double-duty out of energy.
The Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission is looking to fire up the market for combined heat and power, the technology that gets double-duty out of energy.
On Thursday, the PUC launched a process to devise a formal policy statement that would require electric and natural-gas utilities to report regularly on their efforts to promote CHP, a high-efficiency method of generating electricity and thermal energy from a single fuel source, typically natural gas.
"In addition to improving manufacturing competitiveness and reducing greenhouse-gas emissions, CHP benefits businesses by reducing energy costs and enhancing reliability for the user," PUC Chairman Gladys M. Brown said in a statement with Commissioner Robert F. Powelson.
The PUC's policy, which would be written after a formal public process, could nudge utilities to design rates that would encourage customers to invest in CHP systems, which capture waste heat from power generators and use it for space heating or cooling, process heating or cooling, refrigerating, or dehumidifying.
CHP systems are primarily deployed by businesses such as hotels, universities and hospitals, but an emerging market of micro-CHPs is aimed at residential and small commercial users.
Advocates of CHP say its wider adoption is hindered by cost, the lack of infrastructure to deliver larger amounts of gas, and tariffs that penalize customers for reducing reliance on electricity. Some customers, such as high-rise buildings connected to city steam pipes, also lack sufficient space to house a CHP system.
The PUC held hearings on combined heat and power in 2014 at Drexel University and in Pittsburgh.
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