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March 1, 2019
Q) What sort of proof would the Lake County Purchasing Division like in terms of being an approved vendor under the Adjustable Block Program? My company is already a registered vendor under the program and we are listed here: http://illinoisabp.com/find-a-vendor/. Would the County like a screenshot of this webpage where my company is listed? Or is there an alternative sort of representation to show that we are a vendor?
A) A screenshot of the IPA’s Approved Vendor search page listing the company and its Approved Vendor Type will suffice.
Q) For Scope 1, how long would the County like the Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) term lengths to be?
A) Term lengths are at the Proposers’ discretion.
Q) What will happen if the Adjustable Block Program is completely filled up at the time of bid award? Will Lake County be willing to make a commitment to a bid winner for the next incentive program coming out of IL? Or will the County release a new RFP if a new IL solar incentive program comes out and not continue with the winner of this RFP?
A) The County understands that the projects proposed in this RFP may not complete the required steps in time to be included in the first round of the IPA’s funding program (e.g., design, permitting, interconnection agreement). The County intends to complete these projects with the selected Proposer(s) in whichever IPA funding round aligns with project readiness.
February 27, 2019
Q) Are load profiles for the behind-the-meter sites available to determine appropriate sizing of facilities and possible economic benefits that the consumer would accrue?
A) Account data for each specific facility is not available during the bidding process but will be available to the selected proposer(s) upon contract award. For the proposal, Proposers should estimate the size/capacity of the solar PV system based on the area of available rooftop and/or land, and should assume that each facility listed in Attachment A consumes more power per year than can be produced on site.
Q) Libertyville Campus: the parcel listed on the RFP is about 30 acres, yet 40 acres is said to be available. Is the entirety of that land available or only the parcel listed?
A) A section of this parcel is protected wetlands which is not available for development. Additionally, the property is part of a Planned Urban Development (PUD) and it is likely that a proposed solar array will trigger a PUD amendment requiring a public hearing, site plan review, etc. The final size of the array will depend on Village of Libertyville regulations.
Q) Wastewater Treatment Plant (Mundelein): Is all open ground between both facilities available for solar?
A) Of the five acres originally identified, four are wetland/floodplain. Proposers should determine suitability accordingly.
Q) City of North Chicago Closed Landfill (Site #42): 11.8 acres does not seem to be available as a portion of the landfill is currently being utilized. Will that area be available for solar or will only the western side remain available for solar?
A) A section of this property is currently under a lease agreement which expires in 2019. The entire site will be available for development.
Q) N. Butrick Landfill Site (Site #45): The RFP lists about 25.66 acres available yet the site only seems to have 7.5 acres available. Are there multiple sites not listed in the RFP?
A) This response revises the available acres from 25.66 to 7.5. The balance of the area on the south of the site is wetland, unavailable for development.
Q) Does the county assume the projects will seek an ABP award upon receipt of notice of award/contract negotiation with the county?
A) As noted in Task 1 and Task 2 of both Scope 1 (behind the meter) and Scope 3 (land lease), the County assumes that the timeline for the selected proposer(s) applying for the Illinois Power Authority’s Adjustable Block Grant Program will be dependent on the project achieving required milestones (e.g., design, interconnection agreement, permitting, etc.).
February 22, 2019
Q) Are load profiles for the behind-the-meter sites available to determine appropriate sizing of facilities and possible economic benefits that the consumer would accrue?
A) Account data for each specific facility is not available at this time but will be provided to the selected proposer(s) upon contract award. For the proposal, Proposers should estimate the size/capacity of the solar PV system based on the area of available rooftop and/or land, and should assume that each facility listed in Attachment A consumes more power per year than can be produced on site.
February 18, 2019
Q) Have you scheduled a site visit for the Solar RFP?
A) The County does not plan to offer visits to the 45 sites during the bidding process.
Q) Our Team assumes each of these buildings can use as much solar capacity as is included in the ComEd Capacity row on the provided Attachment A B and C Spreadsheet. We would like to ask if there are there any limiting factors, such as the annual electricity usage of each building, that could be provided for each site in Scope 1?
A) To clarify, the ComEd capacity figure is the volume of power that is available on the section of the grid in which each facility is located, not the capacity of each facility to generate or consume electricity. The annual electricity figures for each facility will be provided to the selected proposer after the contract award.
Q) Our Team would like to confirm that the Award(s) for Scope 1 of this RFP opportunity would be awarded on a site-by-site, rather than forty-site portfolio-wide Award based on our reading of point 5 on page 5 of the RFP. We would like to request the County confirm whether it is seeking a site-specific or portfolio-wide PPA rate within Scope 1 of this RFP and whether projects will be awarded on a site-by-site, community-by-community, or portfolio-wide basis to ensure the accuracy of our response?
A) The County may award Scope 1 to a single proposer or to multiple proposers. Proposers should submit the PPA price or prices as it sees fit.
Q) Can utility account information (account numbers, or annual kWh usage) be provided for each of the BTM sites in this RFP?
A) This information will be provided to the selected proposer(s) after the contract award.
Q) Can you provide more information about the sites:
a. Areas where we can place panels?
b. Locations of utility meters / interconnection points?
c. Sizing of your switchgear?
A) 5a. Attachment A notes which facilities have space available on rooftops and which have land, and Amendment 1 provides aerial maps of each site. For those with land, proposers may assume that most of the vacant area surrounding the facility is available for solar development, however, areas with existing tree cover may have limited availability for development.
5b. This information will be provided to the selected proposer(s) after the contract award.
5c. This information will be provided to the selected proposer(s) after the contract award.
Q) We cannot initiate engineering designs for the sites in this RFP until we have a firm estimate of how large we can design our systems. In addition to the land areas you provided in Attachment 1, we will also need annual energy consumption data at each site so that we know what our target solar generation will be. This can be provided by sending us the annual kWh numbers, or by sending the ComEd utility account numbers. At a minimum, we need a two- to three-week lead time from initiating the engineering designs to submit our Proposal. As a result, we would like to request an extension to this RFP such that the new deadline is at a minimum two weeks from the release of the requested information.
A) The RFP is not requesting any engineering plans or drawings with the proposal, that phase will be completed after contract award. Proposers should estimate the size/capacity of the solar PV system based on the area of available rooftop and/or land, and should assume that each facility listed in Attachment A consumes more power per year than can be produced on site. The County does not intend to extend the proposal submission deadline.
February 15, 2019
Exhibit D- Maps was posted to the RFP bid package today.