EBS Ghirardelli Case Study

Today marks great news - 2 months in the making and 2 years of consulting have culminated in one great case study. Ghirardelli Goes Green is a case study highlighting the reduction in environmental impacts and reduction in costs that JMA Ventures and Ghirardelli Square have realized after systematically finding ways to affect both criteria.

Environmentally Ghirardelli Square educated tenants and reduced energy usage dramatically in key areas. Resulting from low initial cost and high value, the results have yielded impressive rates of return and present values using virtually any criteria. Working with Rita Hernandez and Jane Echlin we at Environmental Building Strategies were able to help them find ways to be better to both the bottom line and the environment.

Please feel free to share this case study with anyone looking to save money by engaging sustainability criteria in their everyday actions. Download here: EBS Ghirardelli Case Study

– The EBS Team

The Beginning Of LEED EDGE

Here at EBS we have experienced first-hand the frustration that goes along with LEED credit compliance. From CIRs to credit appeals to excess paper-pushing, we knew there had to a better way.  Enter LEED EGDE!  A tool first conceived internally, LEED EDGE has allowed us to provide clients with accurate, real-time answers to their credit compliance questions.  As a result, we save our clients money by being twice as efficient as other consultants. In addition, clients now have the added benefit of knowing the exact level of certification their project is on track to achieve at any time!.

Problems With Credit Compliance

During the development of LEED EDGE, we saw three fundamental flaws in the credit compliance process:  excess cost, credit confusion, and wasted time.  First, we understood that the compliance process was already an expensive one often leading to frustrating cost increases.  Second, we saw how projects could shift focus, making LEED compliance difficult to monitor.  Third, we knew how difficult it could be for a project to move forward when the status of certain LEED credits was uncertain.

What Does LEED EDGE Do And How Does It Address Those Problems?

LEED EDGE is a project management tool aimed to simplify and streamline the credit compliance process. It centralizes the total anticipated credits a project could achieve in one tab, guiding the user through each credit with point system breakdowns and information boxes, making the entire process less confusing.  In addition, the tool’s functionality allows the user to see the project’s over-all LEED status at any time by offering instant feedback with drop-down menus and easy field entry.  As a result, EDGE makes the LEED compliance process more cost-effective, efficient, and easier to understand.

How To Try It Out?

If you go to our website, www.TheLEEDEDGE.com, you’ll find more detailed information about product features as well as ways to either demo or buy one of the two modules currently available: LEED O&M 2009 and LEED CI 2009.  If you have any questions, please feel free to email us at info@ebsconsultants.net!

Thanks!

-The EBS Team

Many are aware of the subsidies, tax credits, and grants available to property owners and utilities to install and utilize alternative energy (i.e., wind, solar, biomass, etc.). Unfortunately, many forget that these technologies need to be manufactured somewhere. The majority of the panels that go into a photovoltaic array and the large blades that make up wind turbines are currently being manufactured overseas, often in China. This directly contradicts President Obama’s plan to spur green job growth with the passage of the Stimulus Bill. Enter the SEAM Act.

The Security in Energy and Manufacturing Act extends an existing tax credit (The Advanced Energy Manufacturing Tax Credit (MTC), which provided a 30% of total project cost credit to help fund projects that expanded, or re-equipped clean energy manufacturing plants. The SEAM Act goes beyond a simple extension of the $2.3 billion program, it redefines it. Infusing an additional $5 billion into the program while substituting grants for tax credits, it will allow smaller startups who haven’t garnered the tax liability to apply for tax credits to offset some of the costs of their planned plants. It also prioritizes purely manufacturing projects over assembly plants.

This Act comes at a key time, as there are hundreds of projects that applied for credits under MTC that were denied because funding ran out so quickly. Like the “Cash for Clunkers” program, the actual interest in MTC far outweighed initial projections, proving that it was a successful program.

But why, you might ask, should we focus on clean technology manufacturing. According to the Act’s author, Representative Phil Hare from the 17th congressional district in Illinois,

“As clean energy becomes one of the world’s largest industries, forecasted at over $2 trillion annually, advanced energy manufacturing will offer one of the best chances for the U.S. to restore its manufacturing base and create good-paying jobs domestically.”

This is only one of the many reasons why the US needs to spur clean manufacturing jobs. Over the past several decades this nation has seen its manufacturing base erode. Losing out to cheaper Chinese products, the manufacturing industry, one of the largest employment sectors in the US has seen the largest decline in jobs over the past ten years. According to the United States Department of Labor, in 1998, the manufacturing sector employed the second highest number of workers, over 17.5 million. Sense then, the industry has seen a 2.6 percent annual decrease in jobs, which is double the rate of decline of the next-to-worst sector. Advanced energy manufacturing offers a unique opportunity to pursue an environmentally responsible agenda while creating many permanent, high-paying jobs that are desperately necessary to revive an employment powerhouse in serious decline. With the promise of huge green job creation numbers to live up to, why not focus on the area of biggest potential.

The demand side makes an even stronger case to up clean technology manufacturing. With the new requirement that 25% of each state’s energy portfolio must come from clean, renewable energy being mulled over in Washington, and with the potential for a Carbon Cap and Trade system being introduced, the demand for huge new solar and wind farms will take off. Couple that with the improvements that are being made to the efficiencies of these technologies pushing them towards being on par with coal in terms of the production price per kW, and you start to have not only an environmental reason, and a government mandated reason, but also an economic reason. Maybe the one positive that came of out of the recent oil spill in the Gulf, is that it quieted some “Drill baby Drill” proponents. Clearly an increase in off-shore drilling is not the answer to our energy situation; why not look to an abundant and everlasting source, the sun, which creates not only solar power, but wind power as well.

Looking before the future, at the present, renewable energy production is already taking off. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, over the past ten years, wind energy production has increased an average of 24% annually. Over that same time period, energy production from crude oil has decreased an average of 2.4% annually. While crude oil reserves are running out, and the potential for wind and solar production is only increasing, let’s start focusing our efforts and our money on a sector that has some potential. For those of you who wonder where all this money could come from, look no further than the oil industry, which receives huge subsidies from the government so they can continue searching for an archaic fuel source that is destroying our environment. Estimates are that US Oil companies receive, according to Greenpeace, between $15 billion and $35 billion a year from tax payers in the form of avoided taxes.

After watching this video from an old professor from college I found myself suddenly urged to blog on the topic of money and cash flow:

EBS recently hosted a presentation at our office about “Navigating the Road to Sustainability” which included presentations from Shayna D. Eskew of Green Property Solutions, Ken Kurtzig of iReuse and Matt Macko of Environmental Building Strategies. The night went well and ended up being a success with closing semi intoxicated discussions about Commercial Real Estate Valuation techniques and the difference between the dreaded word “payback” and the more robust Net Present Value.

The video above demonstrates how people feel about cash and the different types of cash - needless to say an interesting topic for everyone because we all have it and usually want more of it… But how does cash relate to sustainability and the decisions that are affecting our planet, our lives and our species vitality.

My hypothesis: Feelings of cash correlate directly with assumptions of sustainability investments.

At the end of the day a dollar is a dollar right? One dollar from one source is no different than the physical and power characteristics of a dollar from another source. They both empower a user with the ability to buy something with a market value of $1 - think McDonalds here…
But what happens when those dollars come from different sources and what happens when those dollars are accounted for dirrerently is at the heart of the sustainability adoption problem we are having.

When people value the cash they have in their 401K or child’s college savings account differently than they value the cash they have in their wallet (otherwise known as disposable income) you inherently have a problem of conscience. People will be unwilling to invest those 401K dollars (assuming all things being equally liquid of course) in investments outside of what they are dedicated to do - save up for retirement, child’s college savings, etc, etc. That creates a problem with energy efficiency and clean energy adoption because right now, no one has CASH on hand. Very few people have “disposable income” and let’s face it, the question of “do i have cash” is the number one we think of needing when we think about traveling, doing projects, or buying things. Energy Efficiency is no different - cash is king. No one has it and no one is willing to part with their savings, retirement or child’s savings account to invest in it. This is true even with the transparency of data out there telling us that investments in sustainability, energy efficiency and conservation practices yield the greatest return on investment possible in today’s society.

Yes you heard me say it - Sustainability offers the greatest Return on Investment - better than stocks, bonds, mutual funds, savings accounts, 401Ks, kitchen + bath upgrades to your overvalued McMansion, or corporate’s advertising budget. For proof look to the study I performed at the end of 2009 comparing the Return on Investment in Google stock being equivalent to that of a lighting retrofit.

Google is all too often considered one of the greatest investments of the 21st century but when you compare a purchase of it’s stock at IPO and sale of that stock 5 years later (end of 2009) to that of a lighting retrofit, you will find that the Returns are virtually equal. Roughly a 200% ROI (5 year horizon).

The video above about perceptions of money compared to our understanding of sustainability valuation helps answer the question of why we can’t adopt faster and saturate quicker as we move toward our goals of being a net zero energy economy, and a carbon free economy.

The EBS Team

Ask Your Landlord About Their Green Property Management Credentials
By Chris Throman of www.softwareadvice.com/property

This article discusses green designations and credentials for landlords; how impactful green property management can be on a community; and what the future may hold for green rental living.

It focuses on spurring more property managers to learn about sustainable practices in the communities they manage. After all, over 90 million Americans live on rental properties, which means property managers have a huge opportunity to increase sustainability.

To access the full article: Ask Your Landlord About Their Green Property Management Credentials

— The EBS Team—

The Southeastern region of the United States is an energy conundrum, comprising about one quarter of the demand in the country, yet having the lowest capacity for renewable energy (about 6%). This discrepancy is an incredible obstacle to any proposed Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) aimed at substantially reducing the nation’s carbon emissions. To reach a goal of 15% of each state’s power to be produced by renewable energy, we would need roughly 186 terrawatt hours of energy from various renewable sources to satisfy the Southeast Region’s needs. Among the problems with such a suggestion, are the lack of viable renewable energy technologies, outdated transmission lines, and the finances associated with overcoming these obstacles. Renewable energy is the future; unfortunately, our wind and solar technologies are not yet competitive with fossil fuel based alternatives, biomass technology would require a significant shift in our country’s farming focus, and hydroelectric options have been almost completely exhausted.

Wind energy seems quite promising with the only problems being that it is incredibly unreliable, many consider windmills an eye sore, but most importantly, it can only account for a maximum of 11% of the renewable energy demand in the region. Solutions range from building large hydro-storage facilities (using energy produced during low demand to pump water uphill into a reservoir and then producing hydro electric power during peak load hours) and locating wind farms on America’s uninhabited plains or offshore sites. Unfortunately, all of these technologies will be a moot point unless a complete overhaul of the electrical grid in the southeast occurs with substantial improvements and additions to the transmission lines to transport renewable energy from isolated areas of the Southeast Region.

Solar technologies are incredibly expensive to produce, yield low efficiency returns, and have not proven to be a viable solution on a large scale without considerable government subsidies. Although there have been recent advancements in multi-layered thin-film solar technologies, it will be decades before solar options become competitive if it happens at all. This is the least cost-effective solution for an RPS demand. By covering every rooftop in the Southeast with solar panels, solar energy can produce a whopping 1.1% of the renewable energy demand.

Biomass may have the most potential out of any of the renewable energy sources. In a perfect scenario where maximum efficiency for electrical production is reached, none of the farmed biomass is used for the production of liquid biofuels in cars, and all farming is directed towards the production of biomass fuels (none of these propositions is remotely likely) the Southeast could provide 27% of its renewable energy needs through biomass. This is a significant amount; however, realistically, it would only reach a fraction of that. The problem that makes this irrelevant is that burning biomass for electricity also produces CO2 pollution and does not qualify for any of the recently proposed RPS’s.

Although hydroelectricity seems like a magic solution to our problems, there may not be a single natural waterway in North America which has not already been exploited. Almost all the rivers have already been dammed for hydroelectric power and flooding controls, in many cases, multiple times. We can continue this process in the Southeast, but there are significant environmental repercussions of such actions. Not only does this disrupt the migration and birthing pattern of many species of fish, but, more importantly, it disrupts the natural flow and movement of nutrient rich sediment (dirt). This may not seem important until one looks at the bigger picture and chain of events in which this sediment fails to reach the deltas of our rivers, fails to fill in the coastlines of our country, then fails to feed the marshes and wetlands in the Southeast. Still not getting the picture? That’s OK, there’s more. Marshes and wetlands are our natural defenses against floods, hurricanes, and storms. The damming of our rivers and disruption of the flow of sediment is THE reason that our country experienced a disaster on the scale of Hurricane Katrina. Further expansion of hydropower through dams seems like a much less viable solution after this is taken into account. However, if it were decided that the dangers and consequences were worth braving, hydroelectric power has the capacity to provide a significant 26% of the renewable demand.

The sum of all these renewable percentages only equates to 65% of the 174TWhrs needed to fulfill an RPS of 15-20% renewable energy supply for the nation. Now, where would the remaining 35% come from? The Southeast Region would have to import that from neighboring states, requiring a massive overhaul of the electrical grid and the construction of high-efficiency, long distance transmission lines on a massive scale. The cost of such a gigantic infrastructure project alone would be staggering, however, the constant and never-ending importation of that much energy would cripple the states’ economies in the region. Even if trade-able carbon emissions were a part of the RPS and transmission lines were not necessary, this would still have a devastating effect on the local economy. Options for the Southeast Region of the United States to produce more than 10% renewable energy are significantly inadequate, so an all-encompassing RPS does not seem feasible with our current technology.

Numbers and percentages courtesy of:

Hadley, Stanton W., Key, Thomas., Deb, Rajat. May 2009. Power Transfer Potential to the Southeast in Response to a Renewable Portfolio Standard: Interim Report 2.

-EBS Blogmaster Hoang

The Shanghai Tower will be the tallest building in China by its completion in 2014, but that is not it’s biggest accomplishment. The term “vertical city” has been used to describe the cornucopia of spaces that it will offer including Class-A office space, a luxury hotel, high-end retail, and event space. This aspect still pales in comparison to the building’s biggest accomplishment, its innovation in green design.

With wind turbines, a complex rainwater collection system, two envelope layers that surround nine interior sky gardens, and an ingenious design that mitigates lateral loads from wind and reduces the necessary structural steel by over 20%, this building is setting the bar high for super-tall buildings. Remarkably, all of these sustainable strategies are being implemented in China. To further explain the design process and to prove that sustainability in China is not that surprising I asked the Director of International Architecture and lead designer on the project Peter Weingarten a couple of questions regarding sustainable building in China and how the Shanghai Tower epitomized the emerging trend.

EBS:
I wanted to start of by asking you what the marketplace is like for sustainable building in China. Is it as popular or as big in China as it is in the United States?

Peter: That is an interesting question because on the one hand you could argue that it has never not been popular because a lot of the practices indigenous to other countries are typically more sustainable then what we are accustom to. So we come over there and say “well we are going to talk to you about being sustainable” and they say “we are already are, we already have wastewater and recycling programs”. In Europe they already all shop with reusable bags. It’s kind of an Americanize view if you take that perspective; if you don’t embrace their cultural phenomenon. When we come in we don’t just talk about the US Green Building Council, which is a benchmark here, we talk about global sustainability. There is such booming economic growth in China and India that these issues have been present there for along time. Sustainable agriculture, indoor air quality concerns, getting rid of coal burning power plants, these are issues that have been very prevalent in those regions for a while.

EBS: That is very interesting and quite different than what most Americans would expect.
How did the Chinese bureaucracy affect your project?

Peter: The Chinese government has a strong commitment to developing the future of Shanghai as a financial center on par with New York and Los Angeles and where there is a will there is a very strong way. So we are not getting tied in up the typical bureaucratic issues we normally run into. This project is a priority. It is great to be on a project that is on the fast track and that is well liked. That certainly helps.

EBS: Is the Chinese government’s influence a factor when you are looking at sustainable practices?

Peter: They are pushing for more. We are not just doing because it is an ego `statement; we are doing it to show China’s emersion as green, clean and sustainable. There is such an urban vitality there and this project is building on the standard they set with the Olympics.

EBS: How similar is the China Building Council to USGBC?

Peter: Well we were using the China Star Program and it is very similar to LEED. I think the core tenants are all the same. The performance metrics are based on a different set of regulations. We use ASHRAE, and sometimes they use ASHRAE but sometimes they use something else.

EBS: But in general they are pretty similar?

Peter: It translates very well.

EBS: Is the popularity of the China Star Program on par with LEED in the US or is it in its beginning stage?

Peter: It is pretty popularity because the Chinese are very proud of their system.

EBS: I also wanted to know a bit about the sustainable practices you implemented in this project. The rain collection system was really interesting as was the wind turbines you implemented. Where exactly did you put the turbines?

Peter: Well it’s a 662-meter building and up that high the wind is very strong. In a super- tall building the wind is both your friend and your enemy. Once you get above 80 stories most private brokers will tell you that the economics of the building don’t pan out, because you have so many structural considerations because of the lateral load. With this project we designed the building to mitigate the wind forces by using a curved shape. We were able to save 25% of the ton steel tonnage by not presenting a broad face to the wind. By allowing the wind to flow aerodynamically we mitigate direct lateral pressures. We also made use of the Diagrid System, which allows the wind to flow in a natural way instead of orthogonally like with classic designs. 25 percent savings is huge in the scheme of things.

EBS: How was the whole process of designing the structure to use 25 percent less steel but still hold up to the shearing force of the wind?

Peter: We reached a point where we have the technology to accomplish this. Early on it was about technical achievements. It was about figuring out how to design a super-tall building to stand at all. Now we have the technology and we can look to incorporate architectural aesthetics in these buildings in a much more integrated way. This building embodies the integrated design process. The skin, the structure, the façade, its all designed to increase the efficiency of the building. The way this works you have got this aerodynamic shape and every 14 floors you have what is called an outrigger truss. That acts like your shoulder. The outrigger trust broadens the base of the building. The broader the base the better it supports itself. A big tall thin building will move more than a tall broad building. What that enables us to do is create a double skin. We built a space between the inner skin and what’s really the façade of the building. That creates a sky garden. That sky garden acts as thermal buffer so you don’t have the climate coming right to the face of the building. What that means is that instead of having a completely opaque building you have a clear one. Most skycrapers are essentially opaque to the outside because of the high reflectivity of their windows, a necessity to limit solar heat gain. With the Shanghai Tower, because the façade is not in direct contact with the outside, we could make it completely transparent. For the first time in super-tall buildings you will be able to see occupants in the sky gardens, and you get a strong visual connection not only from the inside but also from the outside. With other buildings it is like wearing sunglasses. When you are the street you have no idea what’s going on inside.

These experiential sustainable practices are so important to the industry especially with architecture. We have the ability to improve energy efficiency and use daylighting controls, but if we can bring a noticeable change to a building that the tenants will see and feel, that is really the future.

EBS: There has always been an issue of how to make buildings green and look good? How do you combine sustainable building and building aesthetics?

Peter: You have heard of the term “vertical city”. This is the first time I think we have actually seen that truly realized. There have been other projects that have claimed to be a vertical city but you can’t really have a vertical city if the building is not transparent. You can imagine that there is quite a contradiction as the building is in China, which is seen as closed. Its communist and this project is open, transparent.

EBS: Thank you so much for meeting and discussing the future of sustainability in China.

— The EBS Team —

Environmental Building Strategies is pleased to announce the addition of two members to our team.

Justin Moresco is a licensed professional engineer with 4+ years experience in the green building and construction industries. His engineering experience has focused on existing buildings, from working on LEED certifications to the seismic evaluation of dozens of structures. Before focusing his career on green building more than two years ago, he worked for one of the country’s leading structural engineering firms. Justin is a widely published author on the topics of green building and corporate sustainability, and his articles have appeared in Sustainable Industries Magazine, Reuters.com, NYTimes.com, and BusinessWeek.com. He is currently a board member of the Northern California Chapter of the nonprofit Earthquake Engineering Research Institute.

Justin is working as a consultant to EBS on a project-by-project basis. His efforts with EBS will focus on Energy Star certifications and LEED EBOM projects, as well as other engineering services.

Justin graduated from University of California at San Diego with a bachelor’s degree in structural engineering and received his master’s in civil engineering from University of California at Berkeley. He also completed a post-graduate diploma in journalism from the London School of Journalism. Justin first became interested in green building and sustainability while he was living in Ghana, West Africa.

Igor Barer is a Mechanical Engineer with a professional background in estimating and managing design-build projects for new construction and energy retrofits for existing buildings. He brings 11+ years experience in the construction industry to the EBS team. His diverse expertise includes biomedical and research facilities, medical facilities, educational facilities, data centers, museums, and commercial buildings. As a LEED Accredited Professional, Igor’s consulting knowledge includes Indoor Air Quality Management/Testing as well as both Fundamental and Enhanced Commissioning. Igor is a member of ASHRAE (Americans Society of Heating, Refrigeration, and Air Conditioning Engineers) and the Building Commissioning Association.

Igor is heading up the commissioning division at EBS and is also working with Justin to expand the engineering services we provide. He hopes to expand his role to included MEP coordination and construction management in the near future.

Igor is a graduate of Moscow State University of Food Industry with a degree in mechanical engineering.

With these two additions to the team we have established ourselves as a one-stop-shop for anything related to green building.

— The EBS Team —

I recently attended the West Coast Green conference in San Francisco and came out enthused and confused.

I was enthused about the progress the green buildingindustry is making. That over 14,000 people from all over the country came to learn about the new innovations in green building is huge for an industry, which in many ways, is in its infancy.

I listened to speakers from all sides of the business, real estate experts, government officials, green building consultants, and contractors to list only a few. They all provided interesting insights on where the industry was and should be going and a bit about it how it was going to get there.

There were also more numbers thrown around than a mathematician could handle. The amount of the money that was being directed to the industry from the stimulus bill, CO2 reduction goals, energy efficiency performance goals, and more and more goals.

One thing I didn’t hear enough of was specific ways to connect money to goals. People were so excited to learn that the government was finally sending money their way they forgot to ask how it would actually be implemented and with what oversight.

After the opening remarks I decided to spend the next three days focusing on one thing, how to get actual changes implemented. I decided to break down this task into two areas. First, I would focus on how conferences like this could teach and encourage people to start changing the built environment to stop negatively effecting the natural environment. Secondly, I wanted to know how to get money to these newly educated people to carry out the ideas they learned.

Interview with an Environmental Consultant

To figure out how conferences like West Coast Green affect change I decided to talk to a presenter who led a session at the conference. Matt Macko is a principal at the San Francisco based green building consulting firm Environmental Building Strategies. He led a session titled Deep Retrofits of Commercial Buildings along with Jose Guevara, Property Manager at Cushman & Wakefield of California, Inc.

CleanTechies: What was your talk focused on?

Matt: I discussed the potential to flip the current green building conversation from its current state, littered with defensive reactionary discussions mostly focused only on conservation, to one where we work on the offensive to create demand in the marketplace around sustainable decision making. I targeted some economic and financial evaluations that a handful of firms are providing their clients as highlights of the quality work being done in the sustainability industry.

CleanTechies: What were the three most important things you think people got out of your talk?

Matt: People walked away with an understanding that demand must be created to tip the marketplace in order to meet our GHG goals. They also left with a better understanding of the financial value that can be derived through intelligent sustainable decision making. Lastly, they should have walked away understanding that investing in energy efficiency is as at least as lucrative if not more profitable than investing in Google.

CleanTechies: How do you think people will use the information you gave them to improve the green building industry?

Matt: I hope to generate more intelligent conversations around how we value “green.” If I had one main objective to relay it would be that we have the tools to prove the value of sustainability but we are just not doing a good enough job to date. I hope from there people will find ways to carry the message along and encourage others to join the movement.

CleanTechies: What is the focus of your firm’s work and how are you trying to change the conversation?

Matt: My firm focuses on making the business case for sustainability. We are a consultancy that uses tools such as discounted cash flow and energy models to prove the value of energy efficient decisions to our clients. Many of our clients come to us looking for efficiency through the LEED process. Our development of the LEED EDGE tool has helped several firms realize significant efficiency gains through making the LEED Certification process easy and virtually paperless.

Why I was confused?

Throughout the three days, and from almost every person I talked to, people had an encouraging outlook on the future of green building. They cited the mass amounts of money headed its way and they mentioned the new standards mandated by the government as proof that green building is here to stay.

One of the most exciting talks I heard was Panama Bartholomy’s talk on “Greening Existing Buildings: The Biggest Piece of the Low Carbon Puzzle.”

In it he mentioned the importance of the existing building retrofit market on reaching all of the carbon emissions goals being sent down from the politicos in Washington and Sacramento. He also outlined where some of the stimulus money was headed, but very little about how exactly it was going to be used or who was in charge of oversight.

I wouldn’t call it lack of foresight but clearly the infrastructure is not ready for all the money flowing in, though there are signs of life. Panama mentioned one specific financing optioned that would encourage homeowners to improve their home’s energy performance. PACE districts allow homeowners to implement energy efficient measures with no upfront cost to them. They pay for the measures with increased property taxes, which should be more than offset by the resulting energy savings.

Some recent success.

Joe Biden recently announced his contribution to the movement. He asked the Council Of Environmental Quality, earlier this year, to come up with a study on how the government could guide the development of a home energy efficiency retrofit market. They produced the “Recovery Through Retrofit” report. It offered several recommendations: more access to information for homeowners, more transparent and accessible financing, and a plan for worker training.

All these things are necessary and important but this report fails in going far enough in its scope. It doesn’t hash out any programs or concrete plans on how to bring all of its recommendations to fruition.

The “Retrofit Ramp-Up”, a program recently drawn up to fund retrofit programs, has started receiving applications for qualified projects to receive funding but this program also has its flaws. It helps facilitate funding but only for those who go looking for it and have the knowledge and expertise to get it.

Compare this approach to the one the government has taken with auto industry. The government does not offer funding to improve average MPG of automakers’ fleets to meet more stringent standards; instead they mandate the new standards. Why couldn’t the government take more of a hard-line approach, similar to this example, with the existing home and building retrofit market? I like the idea of money going to the right people but couple that with some mandated standards that have teeth, then everyone will be forced to see what they sometimes are too stubborn to realize, that green building can save them money.

My solution.

California already has a leg up on most states and could act as an example for the nation to follow. State government officials could begin by using the power of AB 1103 to get  ENERGY STAR scores for all commercial buildings in the State.

The “Recovery Through Retrofit” report also called for an ENERGY STAR program for homes to be created, which could provide later structure to update this solution.

After compiling all of the ENERGY STAR scores, the government could mandate and directly fund the retrofit of the worst buildings, possibly the lowest 10% of ENERGY STAR scores. These buildings would then go through an energy audit where the best energy conservation measures could be identified.

Payback could be formulated in either of two ways. Either the government could get paid back with the energy savings resulting from the increased efficiency or they could increase property taxes and have the building owner get the energy savings, similar to PACE districts. In both cases retrofits would be mandated, but the key is that these changes would not cost a dime in the end.

Energy savings in these wasteful buildings would be very high and would easily pay for the retrofits within a couple of years. The government could then use the projects as an example of the potential of the industry, further enticing interest and generating new projects. These projects would also create numerous jobs. Connected to the program would have to be a mandated education curriculum to get contractors up to speed on how to implement the upgrades. This education would further improve the future of the retrofit industry by increasing the stock of qualified workers.

— The EBS Team —