Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 73.33
Liaison Maria Dahmus
Submission Date Nov. 30, 2023

STARS v2.2

University of St. Thomas
OP-6: Clean and Renewable Energy

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 0.62 / 4.00 David Clysdale
Mechanical Maintenance Supervisor
Facilities Management
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Total energy consumption, performance year:
284,277.89 MMBtu

Clean and renewable electricity (report kilowatt-hours):
kWh MMBtu
Imported electricity from certified/verified clean and renewable sources (i.e., bundled green power purchases) 12,876,219 Kilowatt-hours 43,933.66 MMBtu
Electricity from on-site, clean and renewable sources (rights retained/retired) 30,602 Kilowatt-hours 104.41 MMBtu

A brief description of the certified/verified sources of clean and renewable electricity:

According to Xcel Energy, the university's electric utility provider, the "Certified Renewable Percentage" of electricity provided was 42.6% in 2022. In previous years, we retired enough Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) to meet Minnesota's Renewable Energy Standard, which requires that 30% of our electricity come from renewable sources. But today, we retire RECs to cover the entire renewable energy portion of the electricity that we deliver to you. That means you can take full credit for our renewable and claim Certified Renewable Percentage with confidence that anyone else cannot claim it. https://mn.my.ecelenergy.com/s/energy-portfolio/power-generation/certified-renewable-percentage


A brief description of the on-site renewable electricity generating facilities/devices:

The university currently has three rooftop solar arrays:
1) Solar Array: 40kW Anderson Student Center
2) Solar Array: 3.5kW Brady Hall
3) Solar Array: 48kW McCarthy Gym

The McCarthy Gym array is part of the microgrid research facility and it is currently operating in "island mode."


Clean and renewable thermal energy (report MMBtu):
MMBtu
Clean and renewable stationary fuels used on-site to generate thermal energy 0 MMBtu
Imported steam, hot water, and/or chilled water from certified/verified clean and renewable sources 0 MMBtu

A brief description of the clean and renewable stationary fuels:
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A brief description of the certified/verified sources of clean and renewable thermal energy:
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Unbundled renewable energy products (report kWh):
kWh MMBtu
Purchased RECs, GOs, I-RECs or equivalent unbundled renewable energy products certified by a third party 0 Kilowatt-hours 0 MMBtu

A brief description of the unbundled renewable energy products:
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Total clean and renewable energy generated or purchased:
44,038.07 MMBtu

Percentage of total energy consumption from clean and renewable sources:
15.49

Website URL where information about the institution’s support for clean and renewable energy is available:
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Electricity use, by source (percentage of total, 0-100):
Percentage of total electricity use (0-100)
Biomass 2
Coal 18
Geothermal 0
Hydro 6
Natural gas 13
Nuclear 28
Solar photovoltaic 4
Wind 30
Other (please specify and explain below) 0

A brief description of other sources of electricity not specified above:
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Energy used for heating buildings, by source::
Percentage of total energy used to heat buildings (0-100)
Biomass 0
Coal 0
Electricity 0
Fuel oil 0
Geothermal 0
Natural gas 100
Other (please specify and explain below) 0

A brief description of other sources of building heating not specified above:
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Additional documentation to support the submission:
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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:

Percentage of electricity from different sources is based on Xcel Energy's Saint Paul 2019 Community Energy Report: https://www.xcelenergy.com/staticfiles/xe-responsive/Working With Us/Community Energy Reports/City-of-Saint-Paul-2019.xls

The solar array on top of the Anderson Student Center produced 32,900 kWh of electricity in the performance year. However, the utility owns the renewable energy credits from this system for the first ten years of production.

This was due to the incentive payments we received from Xcel. Unless, you are aware of any changes, we need to exclude the solar energy from the ASC array for this credit.


Percentage of electricity from different sources is based on Xcel Energy's Saint Paul 2019 Community Energy Report: https://www.xcelenergy.com/staticfiles/xe-responsive/Working With Us/Community Energy Reports/City-of-Saint-Paul-2019.xls

The solar array on top of the Anderson Student Center produced 32,900 kWh of electricity in the performance year. However, the utility owns the renewable energy credits from this system for the first ten years of production.

This was due to the incentive payments we received from Xcel. Unless, you are aware of any changes, we need to exclude the solar energy from the ASC array for this credit.

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.