Success Stories
For more than 30 years, ENS Resources has worked on behalf of clients and ensured they have a voice in Washington, D.C. We have built a solid reputation for ethical work, developed bipartisan relationships throughout all branches of government, and solidified our firm as a leader in advocacy and government relations. We would like to share a few examples of our successes.
ENS Resources Advances Landmark Water Project:
East Bay Municipal Utility District
For more than thirty years, community leaders in the northern California region discussed, debated, and ultimately faced off in court over a proposed water diversion from the American River. During periods of severe drought, East Bay counties faced potentially dire shortfalls in their water supply — which could have resulted in economic hardship and even water rationing. On the other side, citizens of Sacramento viewed the proposal as a water grab that would degrade a cherished city parkland. After a lengthy and contentious battle in both the courts of law and public opinion, the communities of Sacramento and the East Bay finally found common ground and launched the Freeport Regional Water Project, which is hailed as a model of regional cooperation. Embraced by environmentalists and government officials alike, the project creates a new water diversion system for the Sacramento River that will guarantee adequate water for customers in the entire region.
ENS Resources Raises Association’s Presence in Washington:
California Association of Sanitation Agencies
More than 100 agencies and private sector stakeholders throughout California work together to ensure clean water statewide. Collectively, they form CASA, the California Association of Sanitation Agencies. Together they educate the public and elected officials as well as affect legislation and policy making. When the CASA Board of Directors wanted to increase the association’s influence in Washington, D.C., they turned to ENS Resources.
The ENS team put together a strategy to make CASA a recognized expert for water-related issues. By promoting CASA members’ expertise and their day-to-day understanding of water issues, ENS Resources has ensured that federal lawmakers turn to CASA for input. CASA members have been invited to give Congressional testimony for changes to the Clean Water Act. In addition, Congress turned to CASA for advice on homeland security legislation as it relates to publicly owned wastewater treatment systems.
Additionally, ENS organizes an annual D.C. conference for CASA. This three-day event gives association members the opportunity to lobby influential members of the California delegation; meet key staff members from House and Senate committees that deal with water quality; confer with senior staff from the Environmental Protection Agency; and discuss finance issues with staff from the Budget and Appropriations Committee. With the expert assistance of ENS Resources, CASA has become a recognized water quality authority in Washington, D.C.
ENS Resources Boosts Sustainable Green Energy:
Bay Area Biosolids To Energy Coalition
Each day, millions of tons of biosolids are generated in the course treating wastewater from domestic and industrial sources. Biosolids have traditionally been subjected to treatment to remove heavy metals and other contaminants in order to protect human health and the environment and to allow for the use of biosolids for land application purposes. Alternatively, where permitted biosolids can be incinerated. However, these traditional approaches to managing biosolids are becoming increasingly unreliable because of increased regulatory compliance costs, greenhouse gas reduction mandates to protect air quality, local community bans on land application, or environmental justice considerations.
Innovative solutions to manage biosolids and address these new costs of doing business was determined to be a priority for nineteen San Francisco Bay Area clean water agencies, representing more than 4 million people, to ensure that reliable options are available to manage and dispose of biosolids. These agencies determined that the embedded energy within biosolids and the need to divert green wastes and food wastes offered an opportunity to leverage a new sustainable energy production solution that could provide long-term reliable clean energy and reduce reliance upon unreliable. Working with ENS Resources, a strategy was developed to advance a federal state and local collaboration. A central component of this strategy involved working with Congress and the U.S. Department of Energy to achieve a diversified bioenergy portfolio within the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
The strategy was successfully implemented with congressional budget decisions calling upon the U.S. Department of Energy to diversify its research and technology development and demonstration program priorities to include municipally-derived biosolids as a source of renewable energy. Because of this success, the U.S. Department of Energy issued a competitive solicitation of $90 million to advance bioenergy technologies, including biosolids. Today, the embedded energy in biosolids and the opportunity to combine biosolids with food wastes is widely accepted as a reliable sustainable source of energy to power our nation’s grid and the growing market of powering electric vehicles.
ENS Resources Facilitates Comprehensive Response to Reduce Severe Fire Threat in Tahoe Basin:
South Tahoe Public Utility District
The condition of the Basin’s forests and the risks of fire, whether caused by man or nature, present disasters waiting to happen, with severe potential for loss of life, massive property destruction, and inestimable pollution of the Lake. (CA-NV Fire Commission Report, 2008)
Severe drought conditions, bark beetle infestation, grossly overstocked forests and a checkerboard wildland-urban interface has created a perfect storm scenario for wildfire in the Tahoe Basin. In 2007, within eight days the Angora Fire burned 3,100 acres of pine and mixed conifer forest and destroyed 254 homes, thankfully, no lives were lost. The Angora Fire highlighted that public and private water distribution infrastructure in the Tahoe Basin was inadequate (and never designed) to provide the fire flows necessary to meet the threat of catastrophic fires.
In response to this threat, the South Tahoe Public Utility District (STPUD) directly facilitated a basin-wide partnership of public water agencies to upgrade the region’s water infrastructure. ENS Resources worked with STPUD to develop and implement a strategy that has obtained strong support from Congress and the Administration for this dynamic and vital regional effort.
Since 2008, the Lake Tahoe Fire Protection Partnership has secured $13 million in federal funding, which is matched with over $14 million in local funding. To date, the project has facilitated the installation of over 88,312 lineal feet (nearly 19 miles) of upsized (six inches or larger) waterlines, over 177 hydrants installed where none had existed, 5 new booster pump stations to increase water flow, 6 new emergency generators, 10 new water tanks providing 4.7 million gallons of storage and numerous multi-agency interconnections for mutual aid in the event of fire.
