Energy Exchange

Building Energy Retrofits Just got a lot Easier with this New Toolkit

By Guest Author / Published: August 28, 2015

By: Karen Penafiel, Vice President, Advocacy, BOMA International

At its Every Building Conference this summer, the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) International announced the relaunch of its BOMA Energy Performance (BEPC) toolkit. BEPC is an industry-vetted, proven process to plan, procure, and implement performance-driven building retrofits that has been used in successful projects around the world. For this reason, BEPC and the I nvestor Confidence P roject (ICP) are a “natural fit.”

ICP, an Environmental Defense Fund initiative designed to unlock investment in energy efficiency, is accelerating the development of a global energy efficiency market by standardizing how projects are developed and energy savings are calculated. Together, BEPC and ICP can be used to execute successful, reliable, investment-grade energy retrofit projects from concept through measurement and verification.

ICP’s Roadmap to Investor Confidence lays out six major steps in the project development cycle: origination, project development, quality assurance, certification, underwriting, contracting, and performance. BEPC includes a flexible framework and supporting toolkit of template documents that can assist building owners, operators, and program managers at each stage of this process. Two key areas where the BEPC toolkit is particularly useful in the ICP project development cycle are: Read More »

Posted in California, Clean Energy, Energy Efficiency, Energy Financing, Investor Confidence Project / Read 1 Response

New Poll: U.S. Latino Communities Overwhelmingly Support Clean Air Protections

By Lucía Oliva Hennelly / Published: August 28, 2015

Politicians and political observers are increasing the amount of time spent trying to figure out how to engage with Latino voters – a large and growing part of the American electorate. Issues such as immigration reform usually dominate the discussion nationally, but a new poll from the national polling firm Latino Decisions shows that clean water and healthy air are also of utmost importance for Latinos.

According to their poll 85% of those surveyed found reducing smog and air pollution to be extremely or very important, compared to 80 percent for comprehensive immigration reform.

This comes as no surprise to those of us that are rooted in this community where issues of the health of our communities and families are often top-of-mind around the dinner table. In reality, it also comes as no surprise to decision makers who have listened to our communities, and know Latinos have rich ties to the outdoors, but are too often the first and worst impacted by pollution. Read More »

Posted in Air Quality, California, Clean Energy, Clean Power Plan, Climate, Colorado, Methane, Natural Gas / Tagged air quality, California, Clean Air, Clean Power Plan, Colorado, diversity, Latinos, Methane, Natural Gas, New Mexico | Comments are closed

What the newly proposed EPA methane rules mean for California

By Tim O'Connor / Published: August 27, 2015

Last week, the U.S. EPA released a historic proposal for new rules to reduce methane emissions from the oil and gas industry, a step toward meeting the ambitious national goal of reducing these emissions 40 to 45 percent in the next decade. California is a step ahead, with new regulations already in development to cut methane from oil and gas operations within its borders.

Even as the rest of the nation begins to catch up, it’s critical that California continues to move forward with developing state standards that complement the federal rules, and go even further when necessary.

Methane emissions from the oil and gas industry are a massive problem – the industry emits more than 7 million tons of the potent greenhouse gas each year, equivalent to the 20-year climate impact of 160 coal-fired power plants. And the latest scientific research indicates the problem is even bigger than we think. For example, a study published just last week says previously unrecorded emissions from thousands of gathering facilities are eight times higher than estimates, and would increase the current inventory of methane emissions by almost 25 percent. Read More »

Posted in General / Comments are closed

How the Clean Power Plan Can Benefit Latino Communities

By Lucía Oliva Hennelly / Published: August 27, 2015

Earlier this month, the United States announced a major step forward in addressing air quality concerns and climate change threats to Latinos. I’m talking about the Clean Power Plan, which establishes the first-ever national limits on carbon pollution from powerplants and places us on a path to heed Pope Francis’s call to protect our planet.

Unfortunately, critics began attacking the plan even before it was final. Some of these attacks have targeted the Latino community in particular, arguing that the Clean Power Plan will disproportionately and negatively harm Latinos. These are baseless claims and arguments that have been debunked by experts.

When the Clean Power Plan takes full effect, Latinos will be among the many Americans who will share in the benefits of a cleaner, healthier future that also affords us good jobs and energy savings. Read More »

Posted in Air Quality, Clean Power Plan, Energy Efficiency, Energy Financing, General, Renewable Energy / Tagged Community Solar, green jobs, Latinos, Net metering | Comments are closed

Real Energy and Cost Savings. Right Now. Here, in Texas.

By Kate Zerrenner / Published: August 27, 2015

: 2015 Climate Corps fellow Phoebe Romero and her supervisor sitting near a solar-powered phone charging station on the Huston-Tillotson campus.

We are nearing the end of another successful season of EDF Climate Corps, the 8-year-old program run by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) that “embeds” grad students inside companies to find ways to save energy and money and lower carbon emissions.

Over the course of its history, EDF Climate Corps has developed into something of powerhouse from both sides of the energy sector: enterprising students (called “fellows”) discover a passion for sustainability through the act of finding efficiencies in the energy systems of their host organizations, and the hosts benefit from these energy savings while jumpstarting or contributing to their sustainability goals.

This year, 12 Texas companies and public sector entities hosted fellows, and this got us to thinking, what kind of evolution and impact has the Climate Corps program had in Texas over the years? We decided it was worth a closer look and turns out, fellows have been saving Texas schools, businesses, and other organizations a lot of energy – and a lot of money.

Posted in Climate, Energy Efficiency, Energy-Water Nexus, Texas / Tagged EDF Climate Corps | Comments are closed

‘Eastside Sol’ gets L.A. Community Dancing to Solar Power

By Jorge Madrid / Published: August 26, 2015

Eastside-Sol_final-1000pxw

Walking around my neighborhood in Boyle Heights, on the eastside of Los Angeles, I see murals and street art conveying pride in the community and the cultural roots of its residents. I see street vendors and informal entrepreneurs trying to capture the America dream, smell delicious food, and hear infectious Latin music that will make you want to move with the rhythm. What I don’t see are solar panels, plentiful shade under trees and green space, electric vehicles, and other icons of the growing clean energy economy. Instead, I smell vehicle exhaust and feel the heat trapped in my neighborhood and many like it on the eastside, where communities are bisected by freeways, surrounded by toxic facilities, and bound by a jungle of concrete.

But it doesn’t have to be like this. Recently a coalition of labor, environmental justice, and community organizations teamed up with Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) to put together Eastside Sol, the first 100 percent solar powered art and music festival on the eastside of Los Angeles. The goal of the event was to create a vision of what the community might look like with abundant solar power, more trees and greenspace, and a fair share of the growing clean energy economy. Read More »

Posted in California, Clean Energy, Energy Equity / Tagged Community Solar | Read 2 Responses