A program to help finance green energy for commercial buildings is nearing approval from the Board of Supervisors, pending an attorney general’s opinion expected next month.

The Commercial Property Assessed Clean Energy Program allows building owners to take out loans secured by a voluntary lien against their property to finance clean energy projects, such as installing solar panels on the roofs of buildings. The program is intended to provide more financing for clean energy projects, which typically take longer to pay for themselves than the typical commercial real estate loan that owners might use. While commercial real estate loans may be paid off over five to 10 years, Louduon’s PACE loans will have 30-year terms.

Those loans are made by private lenders, administered by a third party, and backed by a special lien against the property, which carries with the property if it is sold. Supervisors are waiting for an opinion from Attorney General Mark Herring on whether the county may legally delegate the billing, collection and enforcement of those loans to a third party before moving ahead.

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Have you ever seen one of those big yellow cards on refrigerators, washing machines and other new appliances? These government-mandated notices indicate about how much energy the average U.S. consumer will save by replacing their older model at home with one of these shiny new things.

Trouble is, different people use their appliances very differently — so most of us aren’t average consumers.

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Strategic energy management (SEM) programs are expanding beyond the industrial sector to commercial and institutional customers. These programs and data management technologies are two of the biggest opportunities to reduce energy use at large facilities. Not only do they save energy and decrease carbon emissions, they also help utilities build long-term relationships with clients and introduce them to additional efficiency programs.

In a new report, released today, ACEEE analyzed 26 programs in the United States and Canada to evaluate how they are merging these opportunities to maximize energy savings. Our report finds that such programs help organizations identify effective capital projects as well as operations and maintenance actions. It explores the potential for more programs and lays the foundation for accelerating their adoption across North America.

But what exactly do SEM programs do? They give organizations structure and methodology to discover opportunities, implement projects, and maintain practices that save energy. Energy management information systems (EMIS) help customers increase energy savings by automating data collection, integrating analysis of energy and manufacturing process information, thereby enabling data-driven process control. Integrating EMIS into SEM programs can boost the effectiveness of both approaches and ensure the persistence of energy savings by embedding standard practices in facilities.

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Utilities face increasingly ambitious energy efficiency and pollution reduction targets or goals. In many cases, meeting these targets will require moving beyond traditional efficiency programs – such as providing rebates for upgrading specific equipment – and instead carrying out programs that focus on broader building systems. While energy service companies (ESCOs) have broad experience in delivering these types of systems-level energy efficiency solutions, utilities rarely partner with them on projects. What prevents utilities and ESCOs from closer collaboration? The Alliance will tackle this question by convening utility and ESCO stakeholders in a series of roundtables in 2019, to help find ways to align policies, programs and incentives that will facilitate a symbiotic partnership between these two large and influential efficiency stakeholders.

There is a strong case for increased ESCO-utility collaboration. While component-based efficiency measures are still important for energy savings, systems-level measures are necessary to achieve greater levels of efficiency. ESCOs have decades of experience applying a “systems approach” to building retrofits, which considers the interactions of components within and among various building systems (e.g., HVAC, lighting), as well as interactions among multiple buildings, and between the building and the electric grid. From building system retrofits to integration of renewable energy and energy storage, ESCO projects run the gamut of energy-saving solutions. There is opportunity for ESCOs to lend their systems-level knowledge and expertise in closer partnership with utilities and, in return, to benefit from the utilities’ access to building and grid energy data and their unique relationships with customers, including those in energy assistance programs and underserved markets.

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Minnesota has been receiving well-deserved attention for its ambitious renewable energy and greenhouse gas reduction goals, which aim for 25% of electricity from renewables by 2025 and an 80% reduction in GHG emissions by 2050. Indeed, its largest utility, Xcel Energy announced plansearlier this month to reduce carbon emissions by 80% from 2005 levels by 2030, and completely eliminate carbon emissions from its power plants by 2050.

While renewable energy is the ‘showhorse’ most talked about regarding Minnesota’s efforts, energy efficiency will be a key ‘workhorse’ in achieving those clean energy goals.

After all, any such goals (e.g., renewables % or GHG reduction) become easier if energy efficiency reduces the amount of energy required. Minnesota has long been among the national leaders in utility energy efficiency, which has helped enable its noteworthy renewable energy accomplishments to date.

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