INNOVATORS Gold Award - New Orleans City Business

INNOVATOR
PHOTO BY TRACIE MORRIS SCHAEFER
Bruce Hoffman, geologist and senior project manger with Alternative Energy Group, helps Jeff Hill, left, and Rock Hill lay pipes for a Make It Right home in the Lower 9th Ward.
Alternative Energy Group
Key innovation: umbrella company that installs geothermal
and solar energy systems
Biggest client: Make It Right Foundation
Where they’re based: Slidell
Top executive: Bruce Hoffman, geologist and senior
project manager
Year introduced: July 2008
FOR THE EMPLOYEES of Slidell-based Alternative
Energy Group, equipping six houses in the 9th Ward with
energy-efficient technology within a few weeks, and before
the third anniversary of Hurricane Katrina on Aug. 29, was
something to be proud of.
They truly had bragging rights, however, when the houses
stood nearly untouched after Hurricane Gustav.
Brad Pitt’s Make It Right Foundation hired AEG to
install the heating, cooling and power systems in the strip of
houses along Tennessee Street. The system decreases the
average price of utilities up to 70 percent.
AEG uses geothermal technology to heat and cool
every room.
“We use the earth as the heating source and the cooling
source for the air conditioning,” said Bruce Hoffman, geologist
and senior project manager. “So instead of having an
outside air compressor, we actually use the loops in the
ground to heat and cool the systems inside the house. … It
captures the temperature of the earth, so when it comes
back into the house, it’s 70 degrees.”
Hoffman said the damage was extremely minimal after
Gustav, and he’s glad Make It Right could prove itself.
This technology isn’t new, and it’s not AEG’s innovation.
However, they are the leading energy-efficient group
in the New Orleans area because AEG is an umbrella
company that consists of two drilling companies, an
installation company, a duct group and an engineer, not
to mention business development and administration.
Make It Right’s engineering group contacted Hoffman
because, “I’m basically doing the complete service,” he
said, “as opposed to other companies that would end up
bringing in one company to drill the wells, one company
to tie the wells in, one company to put in the duct work,
one company to put in the air conditioning system,” AEG
handles everything.
“It has to be a compatible system,” he said. “You can’t
have one without the other. I can put in a geothermal system,
but if the house has leaks, at the end of the day I’m not helping
you.”
And AEG is interested in helping people: Hoffman
stresses these systems are affordable to just about
everyone.
“If people incorporate (geothermal energy) into their
(rebuilding) loan,” he said, “their monthly rates are going
to be about $8 to $12 per month. Where the savings
comes in is that every month they’re going to experience
a 60 (percent) to 70 percent decrease in their utilities.”
And after withstanding the threat of a hurricane, AEG
is able to bring a whole new meaning to the term “sustainable.”•
— Katie Urbaszewski
New Orleans CityBusiness 11A