CKenergy is an electric cooperative serving about 28,000 meters in 10 Oklahoma counties, just west of Oklahoma City. In 2005, the cooperative rolled out a geothermal heat pump rebate program at $600 per ton and increased the rebate to $1,000 per ton in 2011. The popular program was effective in reducing peak demand and associated peak costs with its wholesale power
supplier, Western Farmers Electric Cooperative.
Nevertheless, CKenergy needed additional improvements in its system load factor to drive further power cost reductions. Load factor is a ratio that relates total electricity consumption in kilowatt-hours in a time period to peak demand in kilowatts.
Boyd Lee, CKenergy’s Director of Strategic Planning, recognized that if the cooperative were to pay for and own the loops, geothermal would become much more affordable for members and potentially drive more adoption. He developed a spreadsheet to demonstrate how investing in loop ownership could generate tens of millions of dollars for the cooperative in the long term by reducing demand peaks and increasing electric sales. “I did the math and realized that if we deploy geothermal in thousands of locations, our system load factor in the residential rate class would greatly improve and become a huge financial gain for the members,” said Lee.
Lee presented the spreadsheet to the cooperative’s board, which quickly agreed to pursue the idea. Program Development and Roll-Out According to Lee, an important initial step in rolling out the loop ownership program was securing buy-in from local contractors, including the HVAC companies and the contractors that drill wells and install geothermal loop systems. He convened contractors in a series of meetings and provided steak dinners.
“The cooperative has to be bold about how it approaches the local contractors,” said Lee. “You have to be clear with them that the cooperative is moving forward with the program and that they will all get work through it.”
Lee outlined the entire program for the contractors and invited them to participate by being added to a preferred contractor’s list. He told them that they would be removed from the list if they don’t do highquality work. Download the full article
