Committee Minutes

Attendance:
Melanie Parvey-Biby, City of Grand Forks Subcommittee Chair
Todd Feland, City of Grand Forks
Mike Mann, UND Chemical Engineering Department
Joe Bryan, BBI

The meeting was initiated with introductions and the subcommittee members discussed the materials that Melanie had distributed prior to the meeting which included a list of options for completing the inventory for the City of Grand Forks. The options included are listed below:

A few potential options for conducting a greenhouse gas baseline inventory:
1) Conduct the inventory with Dr. Mann with the Post-Doctoral proposal (attached for more information)
a. The cost would be ~$30,000 and be financed through the City per the utility fund, there may be cost share with the university.
b. The timeline would allow the inventory to begin immediately and be complete by June 2008.
c. The administration of this inventory would be by the University and Dr. Mann.
2) Become an ICLEI member and have their technical staff conduct the inventory
a. This would cost between $30,000 - $40,000 for a city the size of Grand Forks.
b. No timeline for this has been identified.
c. The administration of this inventory would have to be through an office of the City of Grand Forks that hasn’t been determined at this time.
d. Cost is similar to the cost of the Post-doctoral proposal therefore there is no cost savings with this option.
3) Become an ICLEI member and utilize the CAPA software
a. The city would need to find someone to conduct the inventory and administrate it.
b. The cost would be included in the cost for the City to become a member and this is something that would occur regardless of which option is chosen.
c. Some communities work with graduate students or identify this as a class project.
d. This would be the cheapest way to conduct the inventory but most difficult to get started.
e. Timeline is unidentified as it is likely this would take at least a year to complete with all the unknowns.

4) Other Options

The subcommittee agreed that it was essential that the City conduct the inventory and talked about an option to work with a post doctoral student in conjunction with BBI. BBI is a company that is currently looking at options of conducting inventories out of their CO Office. The subcommittee also discussed the option of establishing a review team that could work with an individual to conduct the inventory so that input was provided as the inventory was being conducted. It is the subcommittee’s recommendation to the Green3 Resource Committee that they support this direction. The subcommittee members will then request to meet with the Mayor to share this recommendation and gather his support on proceeding with this item at the beginning of the new year.

The group agreed that it was best to proceed with this portion as soon as possible, knowing that it would be essential for some of the subsequent subcommittees to be able to prioritize actions items based on those action items that have the largest impact on reducing greenhouse gas emissions as well as determining a proposed target reduction rate.


Respectfully Submitted:
Melanie Parvey-Biby, Subcommittee Chair
December 20, 2007