At the June 28 Downtown Bellevue Association breakfast meeting, the subject was “Innovations for Smart Cities.” I heard speakers describe how, using digital technology and with little changes in infrastructure, businesses could reduce energy consumption.

Puget Sound Energy’s energy efficiency program manager and the city’s resource conservation manager said the city is partnering with PSE on a program called Urban Smart Bellevue to give businesses the tools to make saving energy easy. By analyzing internal data on energy usage and making behavioral changes, a business could save up to 2.4 percent annually in energy. The director of Microsoft’s CityNext also focused on easily achievable ways using software technology to conserve energy so our communities can be healthier places to live. Microsoft analyzed its own energy usage data to highlight areas of waste within its existing buildings.

Given this optimistic scenario of the ease of conservation of energy, it is hard to justify PSE’s Energize Eastside, which necessitates building 18 miles of high voltage transmission lines through four Eastside cities. Energize Eastside would not contribute to the goal of improving lives as it relies on fossil fuel technology. It makes more sense to adopt Coalition of Eastside Neighborhoods for Sensible Energy’s (CENSE) proposed alternative to rely on robust conservation and efficiency technologies that are available today, such as those described at the breakfast meeting.

Kristi Weir

Bellevue