A move to both upgrade and expand the nation’s electricity transmission system is being promoted by two industry groups pushing for the construction of a modern macro grid network. The American Council on Renewable Energy, working in a partnership with the group Americans for a Clean Energy Grid, says the move to upgrade the country’s transmission system could help utility companies to significantly meet “carbon and clean energy goals by affordably and reliably integrating low-cost renewable resources.” In a press release launching the Macro Grid Initiative, Gregory Wetstone, chief executive officer of the American Council on Renewable Energy, said it was essential that efforts be taken to “improve America’s outdated and balkanized electricity transmission system both to compete effectively in the 21st century economy and to properly tackle the climate crisis.” According to a mission statement released by the Macro Grid Initiative campaign, centers of high renewable resources in the country need to be better connected with areas where the demand for electricity is the most great. The group additionally notes that some fifteen states between the Mississippi River and the Rocky Mountain line represent roughly 88 percent of the nation’s entire wind technical potential as well as 56 percent of the solar technical potential. But at the same time this same area remains largely untapped in terms of its ability to serve larger population pools. Proponents of expanding and building out the grid say one of their first tasks is to advocate for “new policies at the federal, regional and state levels that recognize the substantial nationwide benefits of an inter-regionally connected transmission network.” By Garry Boulard
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Plans are underway for the construction of a new trash and garbage transfer facility that will be built on the northwestern side of the city of Peoria. As proposed by the Phoenix-based Republic Services, the transfer station will go up near the intersection of the Happy Valley Parkway and 115th Avenue, and will be designed to service residences and businesses in a growing section of the metro area. In order for the project to become reality, Republic Services must first secure a rezoning designation for the planned site from the county of Maricopa. Like other similar facilities operated by the company, the Peoria transfer station will accept trash collected from around the city that is then sorted before being hauled off to local landfills. Republic Services, which has reported annual revenue in excess of $9 billion, was founded in the early 1990s and is today a Fortune 500 company with facilities in more than 40 states. Those states include Arizona, Colorado, New Mexico, and Texas. The company’s transfer facilities generally measure anywhere from around 14,000 square feet to more than 100,000 square feet. The proposed project has sparked the opposition of area residents concerned about traffic, noise, and odors that could be associated with the facility. To date, more than 4,000 residents have signed a Facebook petition against building the facility at its proposed site. Those in opposition have been joined by Peoria Mayor Cathy Carlat who has stated that she doesn’t think the center will be a good fit for the area. It is not yet known when Republic Services will officially submit a rezoning request to the county for the planned project site. By Garry Boulard A proposal to build a transitional housing facility on a 3.4-acre site on the west side of Albuquerque is moving forward and will soon be reviewed by city’s Developmental Review Board. The multi-family project will go up on land at the northeast corner of Montano Road NW and Taylor Ranch Road and is designed to provide housing for residents moving from homelessness to a more stable lifestyle. The project, as proposed by the Mesa View United Methodist Church, will include the construction of 30 single-story residential two- and four-bedroom units. A staff reporter for the Environmental Planning Commission, which ultimately approved the proposed project, described it as “consistent with the scale and location of other residential development to the north and south.” The reporter added that the project would “contribute to the area’s mix of uses by adding another type of housing to the existing single-family homes and apartments.” According to city documents, the planned residential units will be divided from each other by vertical common walls, with each also having a separate ground level entrance. As planned, residents of the facility will be required to participate in both educational classes as well as life skills training. By Garry Boulard Although home sales across the country dipped dramatically last month, the principle analyst for the Washington-based National Association of Realtors says the picture for the rest of the year is looking promising. “Home sales will surely rise in the upcoming months with the economy reopening,” Lawrence Yun, chief economist with the organization, has commented in a statement, “and could even surpass one year-ago figures in the second half of the year.” That rise will come in the wake of a nearly 10 percent decline in the sale of single-family homes, town homes, and condominiums between April and May. But because new home construction is back on pace throughout the country, with realtors reporting a minimal slowdown in demand, homes sales are expected to “rise in the coming months with the economy reopening,” said Yun. The economist added: “New home construction needs to robustly ramp up in order to meet rising housing demand.” The organization’s most recent national home sales survey showed that, as a result of the COVID-19 outbreak this spring, every region of the country saw a dip in activity, with sales in the Northeast for houses priced between under $100,000 to $250,000 off by around 44 percent. The decline in the sales in the West in that same category was off by some 40 percent. Interestingly, the two largest dips nationally were at both ends of the pricing scale, with homes priced below $100,000 seeing a 33 percent sales decline, while properties listed between $750,000 and $1 million were off by 38 percent. The smallest decline, at 27 percent, was recorded in the $250,000 to $500,000 category. Those numbers, said Yun, reflect “contract signings in March and April—during the strictest times of the pandemic lockdown and hence the cyclical low point.” By Garry Boulard Documents have been filed with the City of El Paso for the construction of a new Amazon Distribution center on the far eastern side of the city. According to reports, the structure will most likely go up not far from Eastlake Boulevard along Rojas Drive on some 115 acres of currently vacant land. The site is located within the boundaries of El Paso’s 5-mile radius Extra Territorial Jurisdiction. The project could cost as much as around $192 million to build. While the Seattle-based company has made no public comment regarding the project, it has been building other such fulfillment centers in recent months to help facilitate its vast distribution network. This spring the company has announced the construction of new fulfillment centers in the suburbs of Chicago and in the city of Richmond, Texas, with a new center just completed in West Plains, Washington. Such facilities usually measure around 800,000 square feet and are used for packing and shipping the tens of millions of customer orders daily received by the online retailer. The largest centers measure as much as 1.1 million square feet, equal to more than two dozen football fields. Amazon currently has around 175 fulfillment centers worldwide. By Garry Boulard A funding initiative is underway for a long talked-about plan to turn a massive and abandoned downtown Yuma hotel into an intermodal facility. Members of the Yuma City Council have voted unanimously in favor of a resolution calling for the city to apply for a federal Better Utilizing Investments to Leverage Development grant to fund the design of the project. Located at 200 E. Third Street, the three-story Hotel Del Sol was completed at a cost of $150,000 in early 1927 and was for decades one of the most popular and busy hotels of its kind in southwestern Arizona. After a series of ownership changes, the 70-room hotel was closed in the late 1970s and has been abandoned ever since. Preservationists, noting that the hotel was added to the National Register of Historic Places list in 1982, have long argued for rehabilitating and re-purposing the structure. A move to transform the structure, which was designed in the Spanish Revival style, has been discussed by city leaders for several years. But a lack of funding has always hampered those efforts. Council members hope a BUILD grant, as administered by the Department of Transportation, will provide the capital to upgrade the old hotel, building facilities inside for the Yuma County Intergovernmental Public Transit Authority, as well as a Greyhound Lines ticket office. Along with upgrading and rehabilitating the entire hotel, plans also call for the creation of exterior ride share space, as well as a pedestrian plaza. By Garry Boulard After a decline of nearly 1 million construction jobs in the month after the COVID-19 outbreak, the construction industry added new jobs in 45 states, as well as the District of Columbia, according to an analysis just released by the Associated General Contractors of America. That analysis shows that some of the states hit the most hard by the coronavirus were also the states posting the most significant construction employment increases, including Pennsylvania, which added more than 77,000 new jobs, and Michigan with 50,500 additional jobs. Arizona gained 3,000 new construction jobs between April and May of this year, going from 169,400 to 172,400. Total construction employment in Colorado during that same time period went from 166,000 to just under 172,000; while New Mexico’s construction workforce increased from 49,300 in April to around 50,600 in May. The analysis additionally shows that while states in the East and Midwest on average posted construction job losses of 5 to 10 percent between May of last year and May of this year, Western states in general saw slight gains of 1 to 5 percent. Despite the more promising May construction job numbers, Stephen Sandherr, chief executive officer of the AGC, said in a statement that the economic shot in the arm coming from lifting the economic lockdown, “will not be enough to sustain long-term growth for the industry.” Sandherr added: “Boosting infrastructure spending, protecting firms that are operating safely and encouraging people to return to work will help convert short-term gains into longer-term growth.” By Garry Boulard Members of the New Mexico State Senate have approved legislation providing tax relief to businesses as well as individuals negatively affected by the COVID-19 outbreak. Initially approved in the House, the legislation waives penalties and interest for liabilities related to corporate and individual taxes, as well as gross receipts taxes. The legislation, officially filed as House Bill 6, additionally calls for doubling revenue on a temporary basis until July 1 of next year to local governments, and also sending increased online sales tax revenues to those government units. The monthly distribution to municipalities will increase from $1.2 million to $2.5 million; while payments to counties will go from $750,000 to $1.5 million. According to a fiscal analysis of the legislation, the bill’s delayed tax deadlines could “incentivize taxpayers to shift tax payments further into the future, which could shift state revenues into the next fiscal year if tax payers delay filings past July.” Approved unanimously in both the House and Senate, the legislation is on its way to Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham, who has until July 12 to sign the bill into law. By Garry Boulard Work could begin later this year on the construction of two long-anticipated high schools in Pueblo, Colorado. Both of the schools would go up within the boundaries of the city’s District 60 and will be funded by a $218 million bond approved by roughly 53 percent of voters last November. According to the plans discussed during several public input meetings, the bond will pay for the building of a new Centennial High School designed to replace the current Centennial located at 2525 Mountain Drive. The other high school project will see the construction of the East High School at 9 Macneil Road. Both projects will be built adjacent to the existing school they are designed to replace, with the older facilities slated for demolition once the new schools are completed. The two schools will each measure around 185,000 square feet and will include twenty classrooms, three lecture halls, a 500-seat auditorium, library, gymnasium, and athletic training area. The budget for the project is set at just under $76 million for each of the schools, with work on the two new facilities expected to be completed in time for the fall 2023 semester. District 60, with a gradually increasing enrollment that now stands at around 16,400 students, currently has five high schools, five middle schools, and eighteen elementary schools. By Garry Boulard Cities across the country may be seeing more infrastructure upgrades needed for the deployment of 5G coverage in the wake of a new ruling issued by the Federal Communications Commission. That ruling is designed to make easier the approval process for building such new infrastructure, particularly by limiting the say that municipalities have in objecting to towers that may be regarded as obtrusive or unattractive. According to a statement released by the FCC, the new ruling will “expedite equipment upgrades to deploy these next-generation networks, which are critical to expanding economic opportunities and supporting public health and safety in American communities.” Long in both the development phase, 5G technology is simply the fifth generation technology standard for cellular networks first deployed in early 2019. The technology, twenty times faster than current wireless technology, can be used to power everything from city utilities, cellular communications, and even industrial robots. In announcing the new ruling, FCC Chairman Ajit Pai said it would allow for 5G infrastructure projects to jump over “unnecessary ambiguities and roadblocks in order to advance wireless broadband service for all Americans.” While the FCC ruling has been hailed by mobile carriers, such groups as the National League of Cities and the National Association of Counties have announced their opposition, arguing that the determination negatively impacts local government ability to manage basic facility request applications. The Samsung Electronics Company last week put on sale its new 5G-enabled Galaxy 71 phone. Apple Incorporated has announced that it will introduce its first 5G iPhone later this year. By Garry Boulard |
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