Pasadena Hopes to See the Lite on Utility Bills

In an east Pasadena neighborhood of well-kept residences along Mountain Avenue, a dozen people in polo shirts were on a house-to-house mission.

They knocked. Householders opened doors and let the crew of perfect strangers invade their privacy, explore their bathrooms and even issue comments on their cleaning habits.

At one house, the visitor showed a woman that, by simply removing the bottom of her refrigerator, she could clean the dust from the cooling coils, improving the energy-guzzler’s efficiency--and saving money on her the electric bill.

Down the street, another visitor replaced a shower head with one that uses half the water, potentially saving nearly 50 gallons per shower. In a commode, she installed a flexible metal-and-hard-plastic device called a toilet dam, said to save half a gallon per flush.

At still another house, the guest installed a super-efficient, long-lasting fluorescent light bulb in a coffee table lamp. The bulb, which sells for $10 to $15, can more than pay for itself over its five- to 10-year lifetime.

But this one was free, courtesy of the city and its new “Lite Bill” energy conservation program.

“This ties in nicely because I’m keen on recycling too,” an amazed Megan Elliott said last week after she received her free conservation kit from one of the polo-shirted workers going door-to-door. “I didn’t know about a lot of this stuff.”

City officials hope that other residents will be pleased with the smorgasbord of approaches for cutting water and electric use in the city, and, in turn, reduce consumers’ bills and the city’s own energy-related expenses.

Pasadena, which operates one of the four municipal utilities in the Los Angeles Basin, has within the last six months embarked on an ambitious program that city officials say goes beyond federal and state mandates on energy conservation.

Last year, the city began a water survey and inspection program for residential users who use large amounts of water. The program, open to all water customers, provides conservation ideas.

In November, the Lite Bill program started. It will reach 37,000 residences this year. The retail value of the free materials being handed out door-to-door is about $60 per residence; the city’s cost is $25.

At the same time, the city has adopted a rate system that encourages conservation, especially during the summer months of peak demand: Rates are increased for consumers who use large amounts of water.

The city has also adopted rules that require all new municipal landscaping to use plants that flourish in the semi-desert of Southern California. City officials say they want to set a good model for the rest of the community.

Eighteen months ago, the city created the Resource Planning and Conservation Division of the city’s Water and Power Department. “Conservation programs did exist, but there weren’t as many or as intense,” said Mariann Long, the city’s conservation and consumer programs coordinator, who previously had worked in a similar Santa Monica municipal project.

Still, some environmentalists say the city has taken too long to implement the measures.

“I’m still not satisfied,” said activist Tim Brick, a member of the city’s utility advisory panel and the city’s representative on the board of the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California.

Yet critics acknowledge that, when compared to the other three municipal utilities in Los Angeles County, Pasadena spends a far greater portion of its revenues to promote conservation.

An analysis of the latest spending of revenues by the region’s four municipal utilities shows that Pasadena spends $18 for every $1,000 of revenue to help customers cut water and electric usage. Utility leaders in the field nationally spend nearly twice as much as that.

In comparison, Los Angeles spends $6.80 per $1,000, and Glendale and Burbank even less: Burbank, $2 per $1,000, and Glendale, $1 per $1,000.

In fact, Pasadena officials boast that no other city-operated utility in the country goes to such great lengths on so many fronts.

“Most of the municipal utilities are looking at either water or electricity. What we’re saying is that there’s a synergy between the two,” said Deputy City Manager Edward K. Aghjayan, who oversees the Water and Power Department.

“There is no reason why we can’t reduce water and electric consumption by 25%. In terms of the positive impact on the environment and scarcity of resources alone, we could justify our expenditures on conservation,” said Aghjayan, who, before coming to Pasadena four years ago, had set up nationally recognized conservation programs in Austin, Tex., and Palo Alto.

As an example of the voluntary conservation approach Pasadena is actively encouraging, Aghjayan cited the new Doubletree Hotel, where special low-water-use toilets were installed at the city’s suggestion. The toilets cost the hotel’s developer an extra $30,000, Aghjayan said, but there will be a 50% savings on water needed to flush, and an overall reduction of 25% to 30% of the hotel’s water bill. In two years, he said, the hotel will have recouped the expense.

Over the long term, conservation makes economic sense for a utility company and for consumers, he said. “To the extent that our customers conserve, they not only save money for themselves but we save money by not having to build more facilities, improve power plants or treat more water.”

In addition, when consumers use less power, the city generates less, he said. That helps because the city’s power plant faces increasingly tighter restrictions on the amount of emissions it can legally release while it generates power.

“We’re getting on the bandwagon late, but we’re getting on with a bang,” said City Director Rick Cole. “There’s some justification to the boast that we’re going beyond what other (communities) are doing.”

But Cole expressed concern that the city, in its aggressive pursuit of progress, may give the appearance of establishing a “water police force” to penalize those who don’t comply.

However, Thomas E. Pape, a city conservation program specialist, said: “It’s no hard sell and we’re not the water police or the energy police.

“A lot of what we do is salesmanship. We’re trying to show that it’s easy and it’s low cost and the savings are guaranteed.”

The Lite Bill program will cost about $800,000 this year. In addition, the city expects its conservation programs to cost it $200,000 in lost revenues over five years because of lower consumption. Yet the city will save in other ways, and will receive a $373,000 credit for water-savings efforts from the Metropolitan Water District. The incentive is offered because the district can reduce its pumping expenses when use goes down.

Pasadena’s efforts, meanwhile, are not occurring in a vacuum. On Wednesday, a coalition of environmentalists, utility executives and state officials announced a $550-million proposal to boost California to the forefront of energy conservation. Under the plan, the state’s four major utilities would double what they spend to encourage conservation.

It would provide rebates to customers who install energy-saving devices such as super-efficient light bulbs--just like the ones the people in polo shirts passed out last week on Mountain Avenue in Pasadena.

Times staff writer Richard Lee Colvin contributed to this story.

PASADENA’S NEW CONSERVATION PROGRAMS Lite Bill Door-to-door campaign designed to help cut water and light bills for residents of 37,000 single-family houses and apartments and condominiums of up to four units. These are some of the free products and services offered:

High-efficiency shower heads

Toilet dams to reduce water usage

Faucet aerators

Door weatherstripping

Gaskets for electric outlets

Insulation blankets for electric water heaters

One long-lasting, super-efficient fluorescent light bulb

Home energy survey and recommendations

Computerized analysis of light and water bills

Questions: (818) 792-POWER

Note: Residents are notified by letter before energy crew arrives. Letters have not been sent to 75% of the eligible residences.

Water Survey Analysis of water use, both inside and outside

Testing for leaks in plumbing

Water meter inspection

Landscape irrigation system analysis, including soil moisture tests

Swimming pool inspection

Questions: (818) 584-WATER

Xeriscape Policy

New landscaping on municipal properties and at parks uses native plants that thrive with little water and at the same time preserves aesthetics of city.

Source: City of Pasadena INVESTING IN CONSERVATION

Amount per $1,000 of revenue spent Conservation on conservation spending Revenue Pasadena $18.00 $1.2 million $101.5 million Burbank $2.00 $168,000 $79.8 million Glendale $1.00 $115,000 $89 million Los Angeles $6.80 $13.5 million $1.98 billion

Water Power customers customers Pasadena 36,700 55,200 Burbank 26,100 48,200 Glendale 32,000 80,000 Los Angeles 635,000 1.3 million

Source: Municipal utilities