Browsing by Subject "Puerto Rico"
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Item Open Access Evaluating Viability of Community Solar Microgrids for Resilience in Puerto Rico(2019-04-26) Deng, Simeng; Hansen, Asger Victor; Hiltbrand, Galen; Maddex, Sean; Sinclair Lecaros, SantiagoHurricane Maria, which hit the Caribbean two weeks after Hurricane Irma in September 2017, caused the largest electricity blackout in U.S. history. After the hurricanes, Toro Negro, a rural community nestled into the mountains of Puerto Rico went without electricity for a staggering 8 months. This experience led the community to build and manage Puerto Rico’s first fully operational community solar microgrid to gain electricity reliability and resilience. The aim of this project is to develop an effective management strategy for community solar microgrid systems in Puerto Rico. Our team established a price rate at which the residents of Toro Negro can pay for their electricity and an operations and maintenance plan to ensure the microgrid remains economically feasible for the lifetime of the system. Additionally, we have established a common governance strategy and policy recommendations for microgrids in Puerto Rico. Our project can serve as a blueprint for other communities looking to transition to clean energy and increase storm resiliency.Item Open Access Evidence Library for Mangrove Degradation and Recovery(2024-03-11) Mason, Sara; Mustafa, Madena; Dickson, Virginia; Griffin, MadisonItem Open Access Inequality, Resistance, and Reparations: A Step Towards Justice for Puerto Rico(2023-05-10) González Buonomo, TatianaThis project examines how Puerto Rico’s history has been shaped by colonialism, specifically through the construction of structural inequality from the 16th century until today. It analyzes how the Spanish colonization established social inequality through many mechanisms, including othering, the privileging of whiteness, the systematic erasure of Blackness, slavery, and the influence of the Church. Other historical moments to be highlighted are the notable events of rebellion performed by both the enslaved and the free population. These efforts of resistance were continued by three Puerto Rican feminists: Lola Rodríguez de Tió, Luisa Capetillo, and Julia de Burgos, through their lives and literary contributions. Structural inequality became further entrenched with the United States’ colonization, and I focus on the Foraker Law, the Maritime Merchant Act, the Ponce massacre, the birth control experiments, the occupation of Vieques, and the differential response to Hurricane María to show how the U.S. has benefited from and continues to harm the Puerto Rican population. In this project, I argue that there is a case to be made for reparations in which the United States acknowledges, redresses, and apologizes for the harms and atrocities committed to the Puerto Rican people. Instances in which the U.S. exploited Puerto Rico are not the exception to the rule; they reflect a pattern. I made these observations through a survey of the available scholarly literature, articles, and a literature review of the only work which posits a preliminary framework for reparations conducted by Pedro A. Malavet. My project addresses a huge gap in the literature, since the only scholarly article regarding reparations for Puerto Rico was published in 2002. Through a program for reparations, Puerto Ricans could balance structural inequalities and take a step towards justice.Item Open Access POTENTIAL CHANGES IN ECOSYSTEM SERVICES FROM LAND USE POLICY IN PUERTO RICO(2007-05) Smith, Miranda BEcosystem services are self- evidently important to society as natural capital inputs into economic markets, the basis for life-support systems such as clean air, clean water, and climate control, and are integral to quality of life issues. These services provided by communities of living organisms in their natural environment are, in some instances, invaluable and irreplaceable. Conservation planners must focus on ecosystem services as conservation priorities and target levels of ecosystem services as conservation goals, in order to manage and conserve these beneficial services. This paper explores 1) how Puerto Rico’s draft national land use plan changes the environment’s capacity to provide ecosystem services and 2) the limitations to describing ecosystem services and values. The modeled losses in ecosystem service provision that occur with policy implementation support that ecosystem service conservation is not a goal of the draft land use plan. Limitations of modeling and mapping services likely inhibit policy consideration of ecosystem services, as do the limitations of describing numeric output of models, where they exist. Yet, qualitative outputs from the models provide useful information to policy makers about how land use policies will affect ecosystem services. This study is useful for future projects that wish to utilize ecosystem service mapping and valuation to review policy decision.Item Open Access Power in Numbers: Case Study of the Culebra Community Residential Solar Project(2024-04-26) Mandel, JennyResidential solar systems, often paired with batteries for onsite energy storage, are increasingly popular as a source of clean, reliable power, but access to such systems lags among lower-income households. In 2019, Environmental Defense Fund began working with residents of the Puerto Rican island of Culebra in a partnership to demonstrate how renewable energy systems could be deployed to provide clean, affordable, resilient, reliable energy in an under-resourced community. The project prioritized the participation of high-need households including those with electrically powered medical equipment, elderly residents and children. This case study, based on project documents and interviews with participants and a wide range of stakeholders, identifies barriers to deploying solar with storage in an isolated and under-resourced community and strategies to overcome them. The case study can inform other programs aiming to expand solar energy access, particularly in remote and under-resourced communities.Item Open Access Solarizing the Island of Culebra, Puerto Rico: Rate-Design Model and Analysis(2022-04-22) Abcug, Jeremy; Bettencourt, Allison; Khandelwal, RajatPower on the island of Puerto Rico has historically been served through a centralized generation system that has largely failed to provide reliability— ability of the grid to provide the right quantity and quality of electricity needed and operate in times of stress — and resilience— the ability of the grid to come back online quickly and for all consumers after a major disruption. This master’s project team is working with the Fundación Comunitaria de Puerto Rico (FCPR; Puerto Rico Community Foundation) to support the Caribbean’s first community-owned solar utility in Culebra, Puerto Rico to improve grid reliability and to foster community energy independence. The idea behind Culebra’s solar utility is simple: 50 businesses, non-profits, and critical facilities will pay for the energy service provided by the utility through rooftop solar and battery systems that have been fitted to meet the individual facility energy needs. These entities that purchase this utility electricity become subscribers to the service, and these payments will allow for operation and maintenance (O&M), equipment replacement, system expansion and any other necessary services to be sustained. A SWOT analysis is provided to identity the different Strengths (S), Weaknesses (W), Opportunities (O) and Threats (T) for the project. The core objective of this project is the development of a rate-design model to evaluate the optimal rate to charge the subscribers of this solar utility. This rate-design model has three parts – Revenue, Costs and Financial Statements. For the revenue calculations, a load curve for an average subscriber was fitted based on historical consumption data. This information was used in a Monte Carlo simulation to model subscriber demand on a monthly basis. This simulated subscriber demand was compared with solar production forecasts to compute monthly revenue per subscriber. Four types of costs were considered in this analysis: Operations and Maintenance, Administrative, Insurance and Correction costs. All costs are increased annually with inflation. An analysis of the cost-breakdown results shows that correction cost is the largest cost component, however this declines over time. Operations and maintenance is the second largest component, followed by administrative and insurance costs. The results from the revenue and cost analysis were used to compute an Income Statement and Statement of Cash Flows for the solar utility. A set of sensitivity analyses were conducted to assess the effect of input parameters such as inflation, PREPA electricity rate, solar utility electricity rate, and taxes on output metrics such as net income, profit margin, subscriber savings, annual revenue and costs. A combination of the rate-design model and various sensitivity analyses suggest an ideal rate of $0.19/kWh for FCPR to charge to subscribers for the solar utility project. FCPR has already submitted an electricity rate of $0.21/kWh to the Puerto Rico Energy Bureau. This team’s analysis shows that the $0.21/kWh rate will help realize significant subscriber savings and ensure the viability of the solar utility project over its initial lifespan of 10 years and beyond. This project is expected to yield $2,600 of annual savings in electricity payments for subscribers and lead to the abatement of 1076 MT CO2e annually.