Author: Lexi Herndon (Page 4 of 6)

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Water₡lips: New Video Series on Financial Topics for Water Utilities, their Boards, and Funders

October 16, 2014 /

Water utility governing boards serve a critical role in ensuring the provision of clean, safe drinking water. Governing boards are tasked with making important and complex decisions in line with the utility’s mission, and they ultimately serve to keep water utilities accountable to the public. One of the most important roles of a governing board is to protect the utility’s long-term financial health and sustainability. Yet water utility governing board members don’t always have a background in finance or a strong understanding of key financial issues that impact the utility.

A new series of educational videos produced by the Environmental Finance Center at UNC Chapel Hill, with support from the Water Research Foundation, offers an engaging, accessible, and easily shareable resource on financial management topics designed specifically for water utility governing boards. The Water₡lips© Video Series describes challenges faced by water utilities across the country using eye catching visualizations and easy to understand explanations of concepts that can otherwise be daunting.  Continue reading

Conservation Water Rates in Arizona

September 23, 2014 /

by Jacob Mouw

This post was revised on September 25, 2014 to address nuances of water pricing and differences in conservation rates.

Entering ArizonaDrinking water, despite being a necessity, is relatively cheap in regards to its importance. At around $0.005 per gallon from the tap, it is astoundingly cheaper than, say, printer ink, which ranges from $13 to $75 per ounce, and yet is vastly more important. Despite this low price, water is a commodity, particularly in dry, drought-prone regions such as the southwestern United States. Utilities can deal with low water supplies by discouraging higher water use among customers through pricing. Having a “conservation rate” entails charging high enough prices for larger volumes of water use, therefore discouraging discretionary, non-essential use and promoting conservation. In the Environmental Finance Center’s recent Water and Wastewater Rates and Rate Structures Survey in the State of Arizona, thanks to funding from the Water Infrastructure Finance Authority of Arizona, we analyzed 355 water rate structures from 324 utilities. Continue reading

Making the Business Case for Energy Policies: Lessons from Little Rock

September 18, 2014 /

Guest post by David Brown

Solar PanelsWhat’s the right mix of petroleum, natural gas, coal, and other fuels to use for electrical generation today? What are our options for meeting the energy demands of tomorrow? And is it possible to consume less while continuing to raise our standard of living? These are important questions without easy answers. In a democracy, the task of grappling with such questions falls largely to our elected representatives. Indeed, in North Carolina, members of the General Assembly wrestle with tough questions about energy in every legislative session, in the form of committee hearings, proposed bills, floor debates, and eventual legislation. These are smart people with access to expert staff, to be sure. Still, most of them have not worked in the energy industry, and on a given legislative day there are many other issues competing for their attention. Further, they may wonder how issues decided in Raleigh are likely to affect the bottom lines of residents and businesses back home.

Continue reading

What’s the Buzz about NC Electricity Rates?

August 5, 2014 /

sunset powerline

Electricity rates and consumer electricity expenditures have wide ranging impacts on critical community and economic development issues in the state. New research from the Environmental Finance Center at UNC Chapel Hill demonstrates how variable pricing is across the state and the large number of factors that influence costs and pricing.  Figuring out why one utility’s prices are higher than another can be difficult.  However, in at least one region, there is general consensus about why prices are relatively high.

Last week big news hit the region: a $1.2 billion deal between the NC Eastern Municipal Power Agency (NCEMPA) and Duke Energy Progress could mean lower energy prices for many communities in the eastern part of the state. Continue reading

Water Funds: Financing FONAG in Ecuador

July 18, 2014 /

 

Ecuador_bridgeoverthePastazas2“For many people, food comes from a supermarket and water comes from a tap. But the truth is, the food and water that sustain us come from grasslands, forests, rivers, and lakes that depend on natural processes to be sustained themselves. Setting aside wild places alone are insufficient to protect nature. Lands and waters can sustain people and wildlife; modern conservation is about finding ways to do both.”

-The Nature Conservancy 2013 Annual Report

This post is part of a series following the experiences of students participating in the EFC’s Summer Environmental Finance program in Ecuador. This post was written by Megan Garrett.

The Nature Conservancy (TNC) has initiated a program to conserve the watersheds from which water is sourced, called Water Funds. These water funds exist all over the world, but have become especially popular in Latin America following the success of FONAG (Fondo para la Proteccion del Agua), the first ever water fund, located in Quito. These water funds are an interesting financial tool in preserving our water sources and surrounding environment. Continue reading

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