Bauer Power

Mark Bauer is Energized by the Growing Alternatives
Jun 22, 2009
Source: Grand Rapids Business Journal
Department: Pete Daly

Mark Bauer isn't a typical American. For one thing, he likes Mondays. And he doesn't think anyone is entitled to all the cheap
electricity they want.

Bauer founded Bauer Power in Wayland five years ago, now a thriving West Michigan business that sells and installs solar and wind
energy equipment for homes, businesses and organizations.

"I don't look forward to Fridays. I look forward to Mondays," said Bauer. Sometimes, he said, he sits around on the weekends
pining for the start of the work week so he can indulge in his passion.

"My passion is to help people - everyday Americans - understand our use of energy and how high it is and how stupid we are with
it, and that we can make our own energy," said Bauer.

His business was headquartered in Wayland, but a few weeks ago Bauer Power moved into a new location a few miles south, just
off the Martin exit on U.S. 131. He said he needed the room to expand, and at the new site he can install working displays of
solar and wind energy, which wasn't practical at the prior location in downtown Wayland.

From the original one-man shop with one sale, Bauer Power has grown to 15 employees, including an electrical engineer, two
electricians and technicians with a combined total of 42 years in the installation of renewable energy equipment.

Bauer Power has two locations now, the other being in Peoria, Ill. Bauer won't reveal his sales in 2008 but apparently it was a
healthy number despite the onset of the recession, because he will soon open a third location in St. Louis, Mo.

Currently about 60 percent of Bauer Power sales are to home-owners; the rest are to businesses or organizations. The
commercial side of his business is growing more rapidly, though.

"Homeowners did it in the beginning because of a desire to make clean energy," he said, and because some people just don't
want to have to rely on the utility companies.

"Now businesses look at it as a way to hedge future energy costs, and the government has huge incentives for them to do it," said
Bauer.

Businesses can get back 30 percent of the cost for a wind or solar energy system, he said, or in some cases receive a grant that
pays for it.

The economy has slowed his business down, said Bauer, but he adds that there is so much interest in renewable energy "that
we're able to keep things going. There's just a lot of demand for the products out there."

About 90 percent of sales at Bauer Power are solar panels, either for generating electricity (photovoltaic) or heating water for
homes or swimming pools. Bauer also sells and installs the quiet and vibration-free Swift roof-mountable wind turbines assembled
by Cascade Engineering in Grand Rapids.

"Despite what people think in Michigan, it is not a windy state in the central part, where most of us live," he said. "What we find
mostly is, people can actually implement solar and in the long-term investment get far more out of it."

Is solar energy really viable in Michigan?

"If, in fact, solar doesn't work (in Michigan) then I've sold people a lot of systems that supposedly haven't been working for years
and years. I think if you came to take one of those systems down and told them that solar doesn't work in Michigan, you would
have an argument on your hands. Because we have people in this state right now that are spinning their meters backward every
day. It works."

Solar is more suited to an urban environment than wind turbines, according to Bauer. Wind flowing around and over buildings is
turbulent and wind turbines don't work well in turbulence, so they have to be mounted above it. There also are other issues in
an urban setting that are closely regulated by local zoning ordinances, such as safe fall zones for towers, aesthetics, etc.

"We encourage people to look at both technologies, but listen to our recommendations from years of experience and knowing
what will work and what won't work for the customer," said Bauer.

Bauer said his education is as much from the School of Hard Knocks as from the two universities he has attended. He has yet to
earn a degree.

A native of Minneapolis, Bauer enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps in 1978 when he was 18. In boot camp, a psychological profile
and test scores led to his being selected for the elite Marine Corps unit that guards Camp David, the U.S. president's retreat in
Maryland. There he met President Jimmy Carter several times, he said.
After the Marines, he attended the University of Maryland, studying geographic information systems, or GIS, which integrates
hardware, software and data to produce computer-generated maps. While a student, he landed a job at an art gallery, where he
learned how to frame art. That soon led to his first business: working as an independent rep selling fine art to designers,
decorators and art galleries in a five-state region around Colorado. About five years later, Bauer returned to Maryland, where his
father lives, and became a partner in a business supplying medical and physical therapy supplies.

Eventually he was lured to Michigan by his girlfriend, who was a native. Bauer said that Chris - who is now his wife - said it was the
best state in the country - "even better than Minnesota, and I believed her. I came and I've loved it ever since."

In West Michigan, Bauer started a small company doing light construction for homeowners and small businesses. After the
terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, Bauer said he did a lot of self-evaluation "about where I was a person and what I had
accomplished in life." He was looking for a change, which came when he took a class on implementing solar energy, offered by
the Great Lakes Renewable Energy Association.

"It really intrigued me how we can make our own energy. And I thought, maybe some of the construction projects I was on, they
could do that too. I quickly learned, though, that most of the builders and the construction companies had no interest in solar
energy," he said.

Bauer became so passionate about renewable energy that he abandoned the construction business and started working for his
GLREA instructor as an apprentice. One the side, he launched Bauer Power. By 2006, the business had grown to the point where
he had to incorporate.

Today, Bauer is very active with GLREA, a nonprofit organization, and is now its volunteer solar energy instructor.

A Bauer Power employee, master electrician John Koncsol, was interviewed a few weeks ago in a "Planet Green" segment on the
Discovery Channel. The report was part of a continuing series on the "green" rebuilding of Greensburg, Kan., which was hit by a
devastating tornado two years ago that destroyed the town. Bauer Power donated and installed a $25,000 two kilowatt
photovoltaic system that will provide power for the first home to be completed by Greensburg Green Town, a nonprofit
community organization working to incorporate sustainable principles in the rebuilding of the city.
The Bush administration extended and expanded tax credits for businesses and individuals that invest in renewable energy
devices, which is a stimulus for businesses like Bauer Power. A second major impetus was the enactment in Michigan last October
of a renewable portfolio standard, or RPS, requiring that by 2015 at least 10 percent of the state's electrical supply must come
from renewable sources such as wind or solar. Both major utilities are now studying potential incentives that would lead to
privately installed solar panels tied to the grid, which would help make up that RPS requirement.
"People still think wind and solar don't work in this state, and that is mostly perpetuated by people who don't want to change
what we do in this state - which is burn fossil fuels," said Bauer. "Right now, we're still not paying a lot for electricity," said Bauer.
"We have no reason to be efficient in this country. We are being fed energy at the five dollar electron buffet - as much as we
want - and those days are over. Our country was built on cheap fossil fuel energy, which has continued to the detriment of our
planet.

"We need to design energy systems that aren't just centered around how we can mine coal, burn it, disregard the emissions that
come from it, and make money on it today," said Bauer. "That's not a sustainable practice."
There are two energy solutions that Americans need to embrace, according to Bauer: Make efficiency improvements at home and
at work that require less energy, and find ways to generate our own electricity rather than relying completely on the utility
companies.
One of Bauer's favorite questions is: "What can you make in your backyard or on your roof?"

Then he provides the answer: "electrons."not s