Saying goodbye to cold weather is so much fun in May, it's hard to remember back to last July. It was too darned hot outside for a lot of people, who retreated to air conditioned homes and offices. But making an effort to recall those scorching days and the supply/demand power crisis they nearly caused may avert a repeat threat or, worse, an energy blackout.

During late July last summer, Cinergy, IU's electrical energy provider, appealed to clients, especially its largest users, to conserve energy in an effort to avoid "rolling blackouts." Rolling blackouts are a precautionary strategy imposed by shutting down power to alternating towns or sections of a city for two-hour time blocks in an effort to avoid total, widespread power outage.

"Cinergy came very close to a rolling blackout situation," said Charlie Matson, special project engineer in Physical Plant Energy Management Systems. "Blackouts were avoided with voluntary 'load shedding' by clients like IU, who cut back on consumption."

IU developed a tiered conservation plan that would respond to "real-time pricing" or the price of power on a given day, which is figured with a formula based on monthly usage in 1997. The price of power can vary greatly, from a normal price of $50 per megawatt hour to last summer's peak of $10,000 per megawatt hour.

On July 30, fountains on the IUB campus were shut down; water chillers were turned off; and the outdoor pool was closed briefly and reopened when the tennis pavilion closed. Temperature and humidity also were allowed to rise in many buildings for several hours to reduce the very large air conditioning load. The central heating plant, which still has some steam loads in the middle of the summer, switched from coal firing to gas firing, which reduced the number of conveyor and fan motors running. Faculty and staff were asked to redouble efforts to turn out lights and turn off unused or unnecessary computer equipment.

"We had a great response with reduced lighting and air conditioning," said Matson. "People also helped us find other places to save energy, such as closing open construction doors and resetting timers on specific outdoor lights. On July 30 alone, we avoided an $18,000 energy cost and, more importantly, blackouts."

Due to various factors, including another year of hot and dry weather, experts predict a 97 percent chance that the Midwest utilities' regular reserve power margin will again be exceeded at some point during the next months. In preparation, Cinergy has approached its largest customers with PowerShare, an optional program designed to encourage conservation. Three IU accounts have been shifted to PowerShare options-the main account, the Cyclotron and IU Southeast. The main account has contracted for aggressive conservation, while the Cyclotron and IUS are contracted to a less restrictive optional plan. While last summer's conservation efforts resulted in an $18,000 savings in a single afternoon, this summer's could reach $70,000 on a similar peak load day.

There are other reasons that a power crisis may replace gasoline prices on the front page of newspapers this summer. The nation is part way into a federally-ordered deregulation of the wholesale electricity market. As a result, power is being contracted across the transmission grid at new levels, which has resulted in several surprises. Deregulation and environmental laws have slowed the construction of new power plants, even the small peak power plants where permits, in some cases, have been withdrawn because of land-use and environmental debates. Low river levels are of special concern-rivers normally cool the steam turbine condensers at existing power plants, and with lower river levels, the output of the units must be reduced.

But the biggest factor in reducing the margin of safety is demand growth from each consumer of energy.

"Since the last energy crisis, we have avoided over $100 million in energy costs by designing buildings that are more energy efficient. And each new piece of electronic equipment we purchase is usually more efficient than the last. Yet, we keep seeing the campus use slightly more electricity each year due to growth, more existing rooms getting air conditioning, and the increased number of computers and associated equipment," said Matson.

So be a help to the campus community this summer. Turn off lights and computer equipment that do not need to be on. And reduce the amount of time you run air conditioning units.