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HomeMy WebLinkAbout2021-06-22-SLC-min RECEIVED Town of Lexington 2021 23 IIMov, 4,10 Ipii7"i TOWN CLERK Sustainable Lexington Committee LEXINGTON MA Minutes of Meeting of June 22, 2021 A meeting of the Sustainable Lexington Committee (SLC)was held by Zoom conference. A quorum of seven was present. Members Present: Cindy Arens, Celis Brisbin, Paul Chernick, Todd Rhodes (vice-chair), Dan Voss (chair), Charlie Wyman Members Absent: Archana Dayalu, Rick Reibstein Other Attendees: Stella Carr(Sustainability Director), Joe Pato (Select Board), Mark Sandeen (Select Board), Mike Cronin (Director of Public Facilities), Shawn Newell (Asst. Director of Public Facilities), Chris Bouchard (LHS Facilities Manager), Paul Brown (Project Director, Gordian), Mary Hutton, Jeanne Krieger, Ricki Pappo, Marcia Gens, Lin Jensen. The meeting was called to order at 6:00 pm. Todd referenced the opening statement requested by the Town Manager, and all members present responded that they could hear. 1. Comments from residents; New business There were no comments from residents or new business raised. 2. Presentation of Capital Planning Tool(M. Cronin, S. Newell, C. Bouchard, and P. Brown) • The team from the Department of Public Facilities provided an overview of the capital planning tool being implemented by the department to support the development of a 20- year facilities capital plan. The database tool is designed to assess the condition of existing facilities, evaluate each building based on the Facility Condition Index, and generate estimates for the cost to maintain/update the facilities over the planning time horizon. Key terms include: o Current Replacement Value: the sum of the Asset's System replacement costs derived from RSMeans construction cost data, localized to nearest major city, in this case Boston, MA. Does not include site acquisition and preparation, landscaping,parking, moveable furniture and equipment. o Facility Condition Index (FCI)is the ratio of the cost of the Asset's improvements identified as needed in the years (Requirements) divided by the Asset's calculated replacement value (CRV) and expressed as a decimal fraction of one. 1. Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of June 22, 2021 • The team identified that the tool could also assess the performance of Town buildings based on "Sustainability" factors such as energy efficiency, building materials, indoor air quality (air exchanges), etc. • S. Newall identify that Paul Brown (Gordian), who had to leave the meeting earlier, would be able to work with the Committee and provide a more complete description of how the"Sustainability" elements of the modeling would work. Several points to consider included: o The tool could consider materials, rooftop units (for air exchanges), etc. to be replaced beyond the standard system replacement. o The tool helps you work through the cascading number of changes that would be affected by the decision to change certain elements of a building. o The cost to add this assessment to the current modeling would be 5 to 6 cents per sq ft ($90,000)project to assess all buildings for sustainability; however: ■ Not all buildings would need to be considered: New buildings would not need to be assessed immediately because they have been built to the Integrated Building and Construction Policy, and old buildings (planned for replacement)would not need to be assessed.. • Q&A with committee members and guests included the following: o D. Voss: FCI is similar to PCI(Pavement Condition Index)being used by the Town. He would like to see how desired outcomes of our buildings (health, energy, emissions) are factored into the prioritization for capital improvement. o D. Voss: To do that, we need a performance policy so that we know how the buildings perform against those objectives and establish a performance index. He thinks of them as "high performance outcomes" not"sustainability" outcomes. We should prioritize this with the Town Manager. o C. Arens: Were there any surprises? ■ Facilities: We know what we spend so not too much of a surprise there, but it does help to prioritize what to work on first. Also, it identified that we're not spending as much on capital improvements as what the model suggests is needed. o C. Arens: How may people have access to the database? ■ Facilities: There are two levels of access. We can allow you to work in/view the database, but only a Facilities staff would have access to change data. o P. Chernick: How do you use the tool to decide whether to replace or upgrade? ■ Facilities: There's a lot of data in the tool and they are working to see how best to address that question. They have made similar decisions in the past(e.g., the 2. Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of June 22, 2021 Town did that with Bridge and Bowman—they bought some time on replacements by making selective investments). o C. Brisbin: RSMeans doesn't include rebates and other funding sources. Is there a way to address that? ■ Facilities: Given the disconnected timing of capital planning and grant applications, that would be difficult. The model will help us understand the requirements and costs and once a project gets close, we can do a better job of seeing how to best fund the work. o C. Brisbin: ROI positive projects should be done anyway. ■ Facilities: It's a great question. They are looking at how that is assessed in the model, but we haven't gotten there yet. o C. Brisbin: Not all buildings need to be in A condition. It can be better to keep old buildings running than to build a new one that more energy efficient. ■ Facilities: Paul Brown brought this up also. ■ P. Chernick: Is there a metric for how much efficiency you need to balance out the impact of imbedded? o T. Rhodes: Building on Dan's comment, we need to set up the objectives against which to assess performance. ■ Facilities: Paul Brown can provide that input on that process but the Town needs to set those objectives. o M. Sandeen: Maybe change "A" to "New" to avoid the bias people have toward wanting"A Condition" buildings. ■ Facilities: The chart does have other descriptors along those lines that could be used. • The discussion concluded with the agreement that a subset of Committee members will meet with Paul Brown and Facilities staff to discuss the opportunity further. This discussion will include assessing how to establish the objectives. 3. Sustainability Director's Report • EV101 web-event was very successful with 70 attendees. • A Water Conservation webinar is planned for July 14th • The Town Manager is setting up a Working Group is being planning for reconsideration of the Hartwell Innovation Park(Article 45)bylaw for the Special Town Meeting. o C. Arens received an email from Jim Malloy about participating in the Working Group. She is waiting to hear from Amanda Loomis for more details. 3. Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of June 22, 2021 4. Review of the Sustainability Plan Sector priorities /Climate Action Planning Cohort. (S. Carr) • S. Carr shared the latest version of the memo. She had already re-ordered the topics based on earlier feedback. The Committee had approved the content of the memo in a previous meeting. S. Carr will share the memo with Town management. 5. Consider whether to join as a partner on the new GWAC website. • R. Pappo identified that following their strategic planning review, GWAC re-branding and will soom be launching a new website. As part of their objective to collaborate with other organizations, GWAC would like to identify the Sustainable Lexington Committee as a Partner on the website along with other organizations. o Other organization that will be participating include: LPS green teams and Lexington Living Landscapes. There will be to list the Partners and link to their websites. • P. Chernick asked whether it appropriate for SLC to be a partner. R. Pappo identified that the Sustainable Lexington Committee is part of the Green Action Network, which is similar. • The Committee voted 5 — 0 in favor of the motion to: Approve adding the Sustainable Lexington Committee as a Partner/Collaborator on the new GWAC website pending the approval by Joe Pato (as the committee liaison) and/or the Select Board. • R. Pappo will share an overview of what she is envisioning for the website with S. Carr to share with J. Pato and Town staff for the final approval. S. Carr will also let R. Pappo know if the Sustainability Department can be included as a Partner. 6. Discussion of Building Energy Use Disclosure Ordinance(BEUDO) -follow on discussion from last regular meeting. • S. Carr had been looking into an arrangement with Concord where the two towns could share administrative responsibilities for a BEUDO program, but her contact is no longer at Concord. She is looking at other options because the program would require a lot of work and the benefits are uncertain. A future Net Zero building code could add these types of requirements, but that could be a long way off. • C. Arens spoke in support of a BEUDO program because it is a good way to start the conversation with businesses and it's hard to get data about these buildings. The program would be easier to get passed if it starts with just reporting and then adds performance requirements later. It would likely affect only 50 —70 buildings in town. Also that it's important for town to keep pushing because the state is slow. • C. Brisbin stated that a BEUDO is valuable because data feeds decisions, but we need to decide how much data is needed and we have limited bandwidth. He mentioned that we have enough data to make many of the decisions that we need to make. He suggested that we could do modeling rather than what Boston and Cambridge are doing and use a green 4. Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of June 22, 2021 building calculator for the top 60 buildings and to get a good idea of building's performance.. • T. Rhodes mentioned that Mark Sandeen had suggested at one time that we run a program more like the Paris Climate Accord where commercial building owners would present their own building performance goals, using their own format on a regular basis. It would be a voluntary program and the data would not be consistent across companies, but it would be easier to implement. • J. Krieger commented that it's important to get the data from the major buildings— commercial and major residential. She would like to see it happen. • R. Pappo suggested that Arlington could a potential partner. • The discussion concluded with the agreement to keep this topic on the agenda at future meetings and for S. Carr to talk with colleagues in neighboring town about being potential partners. 7. Heat Pumps - update on the grant that the Town is pursuing and other actions to promote heat pumps. • Stella explained that she is working with Abode on a Mass CEC EMPOWER grant for targeting heat pump transitions in priority populations in Lexington. She learned that the program is most interested in priority populations (low income, elderly, etc.), and she is exploring what populations might make the most sense and how to target them. She will also try to apply this fall for one of the Green Communities grants for community outreach. • Some discussion followed, with a number of points raised. It was noted that many of the homes that might be targeted may not be good candidates for the program as they are about to become tear-downs in Lexington's housing market; how do you evaluate this? A focus on air conditioning, and not just heat, might be productive. Marcia noted that an Energy Fair this fall will focus on electrifying everything. Are there situations in which adding on might be preferable (including with respect to embedded carbon)than demolition and rebuilding? Celis raised the question of whether tax policy could encourage smaller and more energy efficient homes; Paul replied that current state law sharply restricts what towns can do with property tax policy. • The discussion concluded with the agreement to keep this topic on the agenda at future meetings. 8. Discussion of Concord's proposed ban on the use of neonicotinoids on town-owned property. • Ricki described the bylaw Concord recently enacted banning the use of neonicotinoids on new leases of town-owned land. This prompted a discussion of whether a similar ban in Lexington (or expanded to all Town property) might be pursued, and whether Town Meeting action or policy adoption by relevant town boards and departments (including 5. Sustainable Lexington Committee Minutes of June 22, 2021 town procurement policy) might be the better route (or both). Stella will inquire about neonic use by DPW; Charlie will ask about the Conservation Commission's leases and any policy on neonic use. 9. Discussion of gaps in solar/renewable electricity generation/sourcing and approaches to close those gaps. • Todd walked the committee through the early stages of a report being assembled by Todd, Paul, Celis, and Dan that looks at electricity use and trends and describes priorities for sourcing of electricity and other renewables. Todd requested feedback at this stage primarily on the draft priorities. The major bit of feedback voiced by members of the committee was to push greenfield development in Lexington further down the list. The list identified installing solar in Lexington as the first priority and included greenfield sites as the last option within Lexington. Feedback from committee members recommended that sites outside of Lexington be considered before greenfield sites within Lexington are considered. Marcia raised the question of siting solar on highway sound barriers and under high-voltage power lines. 10. Update of the Town's emissions report. • Cindy presented her preliminary conclusions after attempting to update town emissions numbers. Examining the period 2012 to 2019, she found that emissions are down 4%, electricity usage is down 6.5%, electricity emissions are down 33%, and fossil fuel emissions (what we're burning in town)is up 22%. There are data anomalies and one- time factors that make long-term definitive conclusions difficult. She also looked at what redevelopment of Hartwell could add to the numbers, and found a significant increase if redevelopment proceeds without controls on fossil fuel use. • Mark noted that thanks to recent work by National Grid, Lexington is no longer on the list of the 20 Massachusetts municipalities with the highest emissions from large gas leaks. Next Meeting: The next regularly scheduled meeting of Sustainable Lexington is at 6 pm on July 27, 2021. The meeting was adjourned at 9:15 pm. 6.