OPINION: Why I Support the Pool and Measure UU
When the City took over operation of the pool in 2011, I was asked to help design how the pool would operate. The system we came up with generated twice as much revenue as other public pools and saved the City a lot of money. I spent over a thousand hours in that effort. I was motivated to do so for two reasons: I wanted to be sure the City’s operation of the pool was a success and I was concerned that, if the pool got too expensive, the City might lose interest in it. I brought those same concerns to the discussions that led to the current pool proposal.
We need to build a pool that meets the needs of the schools as well as the rest of the community. Under the facilities sharing arrangement between the City and the schools, the schools get to use the pool just as the City gets to use the schools’ gyms and sports fields. We are the same taxpayers who would be called on to fund a school pool. It makes no sense to have two pool facilities, one for the schools and one for everyone else, across the street from each other.
It’s time to have one facility that works for everyone—designed so the Piedmont swim team doesn’t have to rent additional space in other communities and spend hours a week commuting to practice; designed so the high school water polo and swim teams don’t have to practice at night or commute to other pools; designed so kids can both play and have swim lessons after school, all with lap swimmers having room to swim and finally being able to swim their laps when they get home from work at night.
It’s not too expensive. The bond measure is about financing, not cost. You can’t bid the project until you have detailed construction drawings and no one would pay to have those drawings done until they knew they had the financing and the project would proceed.
The increased cost estimate from 2016, when the conceptual design was initially approved, simply reflects that it will be built at least six years later, and, in fact, it is in line with what we understand other neighboring communities are doing. When you are arranging for financing, you need to build in room for interest rate fluctuations and other contingencies. Measure UU is simply authorizing bonds.
You don’t have to issue or spend all the bonds that are authorized, but you have to be sure the bond cap is high enough to more than cover the anticipated cost, because you can’t go get more bonds approved in the middle of the project.
The City Council didn’t prioritize the pool over public safety, by putting the pool on the ballot. The fact is our infrastructure is old and needs to be addressed. The pool is on the ballot because there already was a plan to deal with the pool, which had been analyzed, researched, and discussed for years.
The public safety issues just came up. We don’t know enough about them and there isn’t a plan to deal with them yet. It isn’t a question of picking one over the other. If Piedmont is going to be the community you moved here to live in, we have to address them both.
The question is simple: does Piedmont want a pool or not? If we do, it makes no sense to build an inadequate pool. It’s time to have a community pool that finally meets the needs of the whole community.
The current pool needs improvement. But its major problem has been hours of use – teams were made to practice at night because community use, mainly lap swimming by a substantial smaller number of swimmers, made use of the prime practice hours of 3:00 to 6:00. Rather than share the new pool, the stretch design adds three lanes so that lap swimming can still have access to the pool during those hours. That may serve everyone but it adds substantial cost and energy usage to the pool. Is there another community pool with this stretch design? Why not build a 25 x 30 pool and give 2 lanes to lap swimming when practice is happening?
Thank you for your effort and the time that you spent on the pool 2016 design. My concern is that the study did not take into account the City Climate Action Plan. The pool will have my support if around 38 proponents of Measure UU commit to instal solar panels on their homes if the bond passes.
First a few remarks on the current conceptual design of Nov 2016:
1- The pool surface is about three times larger than the current pool. One can expect that the proposed pool will consume three times more power.
2- The shape of the leisure pool is not compatible with the installation of a cover to conserve heat.
Researching the web for information made it clear to me that building an energy efficient pool (or obviously a net zero pool) is very difficult. Let us assume that through a good design the proposed pool will use just twice as much energy than the current one.
What if proponents of Measure UU committed to install on their houses enough solar panels to meet the energy required to operate the proposed pool? By my calculation (see below), based on the energy consumed by the current pool ($60,000 of mainly natural gas), a two times higher number for the larger proposed pool, and the installation of 8 solar panels per household yielding 4,800 kWh per year, the commitment of 230 Piedmont households would meet 100% of the energy needed. Assuming that the proposed pool uses natural gas or heat pumps, given that electricity due to Carnot law of thermodynamic is equivalent to three times its energy in natural gas (and heat pumps generate three times more heat energy than the electricity they consume), I think that the commitment of 75 households would meet the proposed pool energy need. I would argue that proponents should only provide the excess energy required by the proposed pool, in which case 38 households would suffice.
Current pool energy bill per year $60,000 at $1.61 per therm uses 37,267 therms per year. One therm equals 29.3 kWh. Hence 37,267 therms equals 1,091,925 kWh. One household with 8 panels produces 4,800 kWh. Therefore 227 would generate enough energy for the proposed pool. Given the factor three between electric energy and natural gas energy to generate heat, 227/3 or about 75 households would be enough.
Sorry, I am off by a factor of two. Corrected post:
Thank you for your effort and the time that you spent on the pool 2016 design. My concern is that the study did not take into account the City Climate Action Plan. The pool will have my support if around 75 proponents of Measure UU commit to instal solar panels on their homes if the bond passes.
First a few remarks on the current conceptual design of Nov 2016:
1- The pool surface is about three times larger than the current pool. One can expect that the proposed pool will consume three times more power.
2- The shape of the leisure pool is not compatible with the installation of a cover to conserve heat.
Researching the web for information made it clear to me that building an energy efficient pool (or obviously a net zero pool) is very difficult. Let us assume that through a good design the proposed pool will use just twice as much energy than the current one.
What if proponents of Measure UU committed to instal on their houses enough solar panels to meet the energy required to operate the proposed pool? By my calculation (see below), based on the energy consumed by the current pool ($60,000 of mainly natural gas), a two times higher number for the larger proposed pool, and the installation of 8 solar panels per household yielding 4,800 kWh per year, the commitment of 460 Piedmont households would meet 100% of the energy needed. Assuming that the proposed pool uses natural gas or heat pumps, given that electricity due to Carnot law of thermodynamic is equivalent to three times its energy in natural gas (heat pumps generate three times more heat energy than the electricity they consume), I think that the commitment of 150 households would meet the proposed pool energy need. I would argue that proponents should only provide the excess energy required, in which case 75 households would suffice.
Current pool energy bill per year $60,000 at $1.61 per therm uses 37,267 therms per year. One therm equals 29.3 kWh. Hence 37,267 therms equals 1,091,925 kWh. One household with 8 panels produces 4,800 kWh. Therefore 454 would generate enough energy for the proposed pool. Given the factor three between electric energy and natural gas energy to generate heat, 454/3 or about 150 households would be enough.