The City of Vineland, NJ Municipal Electric Utility (VMEU) required an evaluation of power generation economics associated with its generating assets to determine the best course of action to meet future energy and environmental requirements at the least cost.

VMEU’s annual energy requirements and peak load were expected to continue to increase given forecasted economic growth. (e.g., peak demand growth at 4-5 percent per year). This growth, along with the operating challenges of VMEU’s generating units, prompted the City to seek MJB’s assistance in evaluating the economic viability of its generating fleet. MJB evaluated which option, among a series of potential alternatives, provides VMEU with the most cost effective long term energy supply plan to meet system load growth in a manner commensurate with its risk profile.

The scope of the project included: 1) an overview of the physical condition of each asset; 2) market modeling of PJM including 10 year energy and capacity price forecasts at the Vineland hub, and 10 year cost forecasts for each asset; 3) net present value analyses (10 year) for each asset based on base, high and low forecasts of fuel prices, energy prices and future demand growth; and 4) development of recommendations for each asset based on the analyses.

For a global financial institution, MJB in conjunction with a partner firm provided project management support for the separation of its Global Merchant Services Division. Within the Program Management Office, MJB managed the weekly reporting and tracking of actual versus budget performance for 10 work streams and over 40 projects, totaling >$10MM. The role required coordinating with project managers to track performance against cost and schedule and report on progress on a weekly basis.

As a result of MJB’s and our partner’s involvement, client senior management regained visibility into separation-related cost and schedule activity and forecasts. Overall, the corporate separation occurred under-budget by approximately $3MM.

Follow M.J. Beck Consulting (MJB) Director, Jonathan McClelland on Twitter @mcclelland_nyc. Plus receive updates on states’ renewable energy policies by following @TheRPSEdge which compliments MJB’s online database of Renewable Portfolio Standards

This week, Jonathan McClelland, Director in the M.J. Beck Consulting (MJB) New York office participated at the CERES Investor Summit on Climate Risk and Energy Solutions at the United Nations headquarters in midtown Manhattan. The program included excellent array of panels and speakers including Goldman Sachs Analyst, Abby Joseph Cohen and UN Foundation President, Tim Wirth.

The Committee of Chief Risk Officers (CCRO), an independent non-profit corporation of member companies dedicated to the advancement of a broad range of best practices in the field of risk management, regularly develops and issues White Papers on a variety of topical areas of interest relevant to the energy industry, facilitated by consulting expertise.

The CCRO, whose members include companies of all types and sizes engaged in the energy industry, engaged MJB to facilitate the development of a White Paper on Market Clearing in the Energy Industry. The purpose of this paper was to advance the use of financial as well as physical clearing in the energy industry by: contributing to a common understanding and definition of clearing; identifying its benefits to the market; identifying hurdles and challenges still present; and presenting recommendations that promote its appropriate application and development. The paper also provided a summary description of each of the major vendors offering clearing solutions and a side-by-side comparison of them versus desired clearing attributes. The paper has been one of the more widely quoted White Papers that the CCRO has issued.

The team at M.J. Beck Consulting (MJB) would like to wish our clients, partners and members of the energy community the very best for this holiday season and the coming year.

It has been our privilege to deliver on some high profile and critical client projects during the course of 2011. We look forward to serving existing and new electricity industry clients with strategic, economics and operations analysis in 2012.

Bill Klun, Senior Advisor to M.J. Beck Consulting (MJB), will speak at the Johns Hopkins Biotech Network on November 16th.  Klun’s speech, “A Practical Guide to Technology Commercialization – How to Build A Business in Biofuel Innovation”, will address the diverse field of renewable fuel production, renewable energy policy, and technology commercialization.

The seminar, to be held at the Johns Hopkins campus in Baltimore, MD will bring together experts in the field to discuss current issues in bringing a renewable technology to market, and the financial opportunities for start-ups to move into the renewable energy sector.