Southwest Connecticut (SWCT)

The area of Connecticut between Greenwich and New Haven is one of the nation’s most constrained transmission areas and one of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission’s 10 “areas of concern” for electric reliability in the United States.  In addition, it suffers from threats to its air quality, and is a non-attainment area for ozone. 

There are a number of projects finding solutions to these problems.  One of these, the Southwest Connecticut Clean Demand Response Pilot, has brought Connecticut’s state agencies into a new partnership with national groups to find ways to use energy conservation, energy efficiency, and renewable energy to provide clean, reliable electricity to SWCT.

 The SWCT Clean Demand Response Pilot

With some initial support from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), the Connecticut Departments of Environmental Protection (DEP) and Public Utility Control (DPUC), the Connecticut Office of Policy and Management (OPM), the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners (NARUC), the National Association of State Energy Officials (NASEO), the Ozone Transport Commission (OTC), and the Global Environment and Technology Foundation have been working together to put a pilot project into place which will attempt to encourage energy efficiency and clean energy technologies to address reliability concerns in ways that are consistent with meeting air quality goals. 

This project has involved bringing these Connecticut agencies and their national partner organizations together with representatives of the Connecticut business community, municipalities local environmental groups, the New England Independent System Operator, and the utilities to determine what programs could be designed that would help energy consumers in Connecticut meet their electricity needs reliably without compromising the environment.  At the same time, the project is exploring the barriers to success of existing and planned energy efficiency, conservation, clean load management, and clean distributed generation projects to determine how to maximize their success.  Phase I of this project was completed in the fall of 2002, and Phase II will capitalize on opportunities for energy efficiency and demand management strategies to meet this challenge for the summer of 2003.

 For more information, contact:

Ginger Teubner, Connecticut Department of Public Utility Control
(860) 827-2630 ginger.teubner@po.state.ct.us

John Ruckes, Connecticut Office of Policy and Management
(860) 418-6384 john.ruckes@po.state.ct.us  

Rick Rodrigue Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection (DEP)
(860) 424-3429 richard.rodrigue@ct.gov

Last edit 03/30/2009