Welcome back, in this video, we'll be talking about information and data gathering for our feasibility analysis for our project. We'll be discussing high level data needed for feasibility analysis. Again, emphasis on high level, not the detailed data that will eventually need to execute the project. Well, look at sources of information, estimate renewable energy resources, collect data site information. Well, look at incentives, regulations and permitting, survey technologies and vendors estimate project costs, estimate projects revenues and identify stakeholders. Again, all of these are the high level, we want to get up the lay of the land to figure out if this project actually will be feasible. When we think about sources of information, we want to emphasize to leave no stone unturned in your search for data information and insights and that working is going to be critical in your activities. Talk to everyone and anyone that you can. Talk to current operators of renewable energy sites, talked to equipment vendors, contractors and installers, trade organizations, community groups, renewable interest groups, government regulators, universities and colleges, commercial consultants and then networks are more can emphasize enough. The more connections you make, the more information you gather, the more allies you can garner the better off you'll be in the long run. Let's now talk about sources of data on renewable resource availability in your region. There are abundant online resources for wind, solar, geothermal ,hydropower, ocean energy and others available for free online. There's also free and commercial software online. There are government offices, agencies and departments that often collect information on resource availability in your area. There are non governmental organizations in energy, environmental organizations, sustainability, climate organizations that often have good information on resource availability. And finally, there are commercial services, consultancy fees and data consolidators that will provide information or do studies for you at a price, Next you'll need to collect information about possible sites for renewable energy project. If you don't already have a site selected, governments, local and national often have good information about a particular site. Land planning departments, renewable energy offices, business development agencies are all good sources of information. Non-governmental sources include contractors and installers, chambers of commerce, real estate brokers, neighborhood organizations and developers, contractors and installers. All these folks can tell you a lot about the pros and cons of developing in a particular region or area, Critically important in developing a renewable energy project is determination of relevant government incentives, regulations and permitting requirements. National governments have regulations with their texts with tax incentives and grants. Energy agencies may have regulations, their transmission and distribution regulators and environmental agencies. All that will have a say in the construction of your renewable energy project. Local governments have land planning offices that may have regulations and licenses that need to be obtained. There may be zoning boards to attend to, building code departments, all of whom are interested in your project and finally, their private regulators, condo and home-owner associations, for instance, will want to be involved with the development of your project if it's a local project on their properties. As we investigate the feasibility of our project will need to collect information on alternative technologies and vendors. We can get this information from equipment manufacturers, from sales personnel in the region who often have broad insights and experience in your region and industry associations, trade publications, user organizations, current customers, contractors and installers and engineering firms. All of these folks can provide information about technologies and vendors that may be of interest to you, Next is to develop estimates of project costs. There is publicly available data that you can find online, their government agencies, industry trade groups, consulting publications, public software. All that can help provide that information. There's commercially available data from consulting firms, engineering companies, installers and contractors, commercial software products and so forth. They can help you identify what you're likely project costs will be, A crucial next step in evaluating the feasibility of your project is to determine potential project revenue sources and amounts. You may be selling your energy. You need to identify potential off takers that his customers and inquire about likely prices that you can get for the energy you generate. There may be public markets that you can sell your energy into. There may be great government regulations and policies that will help you with your revenues, such as net metering, feed in tariffs and other incentives. Alternatively, you may be avoiding costs by generating your own electricity. This is electricity not purchased you generated yourself instead of buying it, there may be tax credits and deductions that improve your revenue stream. There may be an energy price inflation that you can avoid by building your own energy source of energy. All of these can contribute to the feasibility of a project. Also of great importance is to identify and contact all parties that will have an interest in your project. This can include government agencies, local governments, planning agencies, power regulators, local contractors, chambers of commerce, potential investors, potential vendors and suppliers, potential customers of course and project neighbors if it's a small project or even a large project. All of these folks will have some influence and say on your project whether you want them to or not, it's better to get them involved early rather than later. So you can start to address any regular, any pushback that you may get from these stakeholders or identify allies that will help you get the project launched, In summary we need to gather high level data that's needed for our feasibility analysis. We need to understand the sources of information. We need to estimate renewable energy resources in our region. We need to collect site information. We need to understand incentives, regulations and permitting, we need to survey technologies and vendors that we might want to use. We need to estimate project costs and we need to estimate project revenues. In the next video we'll be taking a look at actually constructing the feasibility analysis. Hope to see you there.
