They don’t have cell-phone reception but they’ve got a grange and a pretty neat new wastewater facility. It’s the good-old town of Amesville, OH and they’ve got some things to say about energy.
Ohio University isn't the only institution trying to move away from depending on coal and countywide electric aggregation. There are others in the area making the same efforts, says a mayor in the area who believes his village’s efforts are sometimes overshadowed.
“Everything happens in Athens, with it being the population base and (the site of) the university,” said Amesville Mayor Gary Goosman. “But it certainly doesn’t have a monopoly on innovation.”
That’s why the League of Women Voters of Athens County and Goosman invited public officials and county residents to Amesville on Saturday for a day-long symposium on local alternative energy initiatives.
Amesville is about 14 miles from OU’s campus.
Local government officials, and representatives from OU and third-party alternative energy corporations all gave speeches. The speakers addressed their own clean energy efforts, and ways for locals to improve their own energy efficiency.
The event had about 65 registered attendees, attracting citizens from Albany, Athens and Coolville, including Athens Mayor Paul Wiehl, several Athens city council members, and state representative Debbie Phillips, D-Albany.
Goosman gave a presentation on some of the efforts Amesville has made in an attempt to reduce their dependence on fossil fuels and improve their energy efficiency.
The Amesville mayor emphasized their new wastewater treatment facility, which he said is half of the cost and uses half of the energy of their previous plant. Goosman said this effort also allowed for the cleanup of Federal Creek, which had been in need of a restoration project.
The event’s attendees also heard from a panel consisting of Athens County Commissioner Chris Chmiel, electric aggregation consultant Roger Wilkens, and OU senior associate vice president of information technologies and administrative services Joe Lalley.
Chmiel discussed electrical aggregation plans and the county’s UpGrade Athens project.
The UpGrade Athens Project will enter the county in a Georgetown University-led contest, through which the area could be awarded $5,000 to fund energy-saving improvements.
The contest pits Athens against towns such as Palo Alto, California, but Chmiel said winning isn’t exactly the point.
“We want to learn from each other,” Chmiel said of the cities and counties involved in the contest. “Even if we don’t win, we will benefit greatly.”
“We’ve got a lot of smart people in this town and I think we can grab a lot of low-hanging fruit,” he added.
Lalley also discussed OU’s plan to stop using coal by the end of 2015. He guessed OU would likely turn to natural gas as an alternative energy source, although he admitted that such a switch might not be a suitable long-term solution.
“It’s an intermediate step,” he said. “It doesn’t lock us into burning gas in the long run.”
With that change and others — including electric aggregation — on the horizon, Goosman said the symposium could not have come at a better time.
“Right now it’s the perfect storm in the county,” he said.
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