We leverage our expertise in energy policy and regulation to help our clients navigate the complexities of markets, resource planning and adequacy, and ensure compliance. We develop strategies, understand and manage risks, and create solutions. Our services include:
Our team understands the challenges of power generation and delivery. We take time to learn the nuances of your operations and then deploy our expertise in a targeted fashion to ensure solutions are not only efficient but effectively tailored to your unique operations. In an era of unprecedented investment in sustainable energy infrastructure, we help our clients develop and implement sound business practices that consistently lead to confident decisions.
Sapere provides experience in key areas of the energy industry and we deploy our experience in a targeted fashion on behalf of our client.
Large investment decisions are difficult. Our Energy Solutions Practice leverages diverse backgrounds and project exposure to provide the subject matter expertise that our clients rely on to make confident decisions on large capital projects.
Shifts in regulatory policy and evolution in regional coordination efforts require energy companies to reconsider the configuration of their operations. At Sapere we understand the balance between effective governance and robust stakeholder participation. We help our clients design and implement new organizational programs and business functions to keep up with evolving business objectives.
Sound decisions are not made in a vacuum. In a dynamic, rapidly evolving energy landscape, we help our clients navigate the hidden traps and fallacies of decision making to plan for the future confidently.
Clients we're proud to partner with.
We completed a financial analysis demonstrating that a financial hedge to mitigate foreign currency risk would result in significant savings for the public utility off-takers of the output from a wind farm in Washington State. Our team worked with the client group to determine the best possible hedge strategy given their risk profiles and individual needs. We supported this process from the initial analysis to the final execution of trades.
For years, we have developed a client’s budget and assisted in navigating the local regulatory commission’s budget ratification process. We have developed a process that allows interested stakeholders to participate early in budget development. By conducting a series of informal public budget sessions, various stakeholders with differing perspectives have come to a consensus on major issues. This has resulted in substantially less resistance from stakeholders upon final budget submission to the regulatory commission, resulting in reduced legal fees and greater budgetary certainty for the client.
We supported a national client who owns and operates a gas-fired cogeneration facility in Washington State by assessing the impacts of new clean energy regulations on their operations and electricity sales. We leveraged our expertise in state and regional regulatory policy and electricity markets to evaluate the financial viability of the facility to operate in several different possible configurations through 2050 and delivered a comprehensive roadmap for strategic asset management. Our report provided the client with the tools that they need to navigate a turbulent regulatory environment and maximize the value of their resource today and into the future.
We analyzed regional and state energy policy and reviewed numerous long-term resource planning documents published by public and investor-owned utilities in the West to evaluate their carbon and greenhouse gas reduction goals, projected energy and capacity needs, nuclear modeling assumptions, and receptivity to small modular reactor technology. The findings provided our client with a comprehensive understanding of the regulatory and market landscape, enabling them to identify and rank viable opportunities and strategically target utilities aligned with their innovative nuclear solutions.
We worked with partners at the Southwestern Power Administration and Idaho National Laboratory to evaluate the business use case for installation of a 20MW battery co-located at an existing hydropower dam on the Illinois River. The analysis investigated alternative dispatch scenarios for the hydro project that could only be economically feasible with the addition of a lithium-ion battery. We used predictive modeling techniques to analyze the impact of reshaping daily discharge profiles on downstream dissolved oxygen levels and water temperatures, with the objective of optimizing water quality for biological purposes. The water quality analysis was paired with a market optimization study showing that conversion to a hydro-battery hybrid had the potential to both significantly increase annual revenue from optimized energy sales and improve downstream water quality for biological purposes.
We led and facilitated a group of more than 20 stakeholders through the successful development of the first-ever regional resource adequacy program in the West. Participants included public and investor-owned utilities, industry groups, regulators, and federal agencies. The program, now operational, provides a framework for regional cooperation amongst load-serving entities in the West to measure and enforce a regional capacity reliability standard on a planned and operational basis. A standardized regional reserve capacity metric will mitigate exposure to reliability events causd by extreme weather and other force-measure scenarios. A commitment to sharing excess generating capacity in times of need will significantly lower costs and improve the chances of keeping the lights on when we need them the most.
We facilitate a monthly meeting series attended by members of several public utilities in the Pacific Northwest and their federal power administration to collaborate on energy policy and product implementation. The venue has been active for almost 20 years, providing a space for public power to play an active role in shaping the future of the energy landscape in their region and ensure that their customers’ interests are represented and considered in momentous regional energy policy decisions.
Our project teams are integrated across practices to make sure we have the right skills, knowledge, and understanding applied to the problem.
