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Statewide LG EE Best Practices: Weekly Update
Here are your wEEkly updates:
1. California Adaptation Forum: Last call for
discounted rates for September’s 2nd California
Adaptation Forum! Register for the Forum by Wednesday, August 12 and
receive $50 OFF One-Day and Full Forum rates! The Forum is an incredible
opportunity to connect with hundreds of climate leaders from across the
state. See
more opportunities, a full Forum program, Forum events, plenary speakers and
partners, and more.
2. Statewide Codes & Standards Team Conference
Call: The Statewide Codes & Standards team works to develop resources
to help local governments consider, adopt, and measure energy-saving successes
from reach codes. If you are a local government interested in learning more,
and/or hearing troubleshooting and success stories from other local governments
across the state, please contact the Coordinator at jdecker@lgc.org to RSVP to this
call.
3. New CEC Funding for EE Tech Demonstrations:
On August 1st, the California Energy Commission (CEC) announced
a grant funding opportunity for Emerging Energy Efficient Technology
Demonstrations (GFO-16-304), and will be holding a pre-bid conference workshop
August 11th.
4. CEC LinkedIn Networking Group for Open GFOs:
Looking to find partners for the above grant funding opportunity? The
California Energy Commission Networking Hub on LinkedIn has
set up networking groups for the Technology Demonstration GFO, and
three others.
5. Federal Gov. Energy Webinars this August: A
list of August
2016 webinars is now available from federal agencies providing support
on the EPA benchmarking tool Portfolio Manager, data center energy efficiency,
EE financing, community resiliency through EE, resilient solar retrofits, waste
management, and more.
6. What’s New with AB 802? In case you
missed the July 22nd workshop held by the California Energy Commission on AB
802 implementation (Project Title, “Building Energy Use Disclosure and Public
Benchmarking Program Mandated under Assembly Bill 802”), a transcript
is now available from the CEC.
7. More on AB 802: Also in case you missed it:
additional guidance linked to energy savings measurement was released in
the CPUC’s
recent decision providing guidance on Program Administrator EE
business plans. (Need a refresher
on AB 802?)
8. SB 350 Low-Income Barriers Workshop 8/12:
The California Energy Commission conducting
a workshop August 12th to gather input on barriers faced by low-income
and disadvantaged communities to investing in energy efficiency and
weatherization, installing solar photovoltaic and other renewable generating
resources, and contracting opportunities for small businesses. This input will
be included in the “Senate Bill 350 Barriers Study,” required by the Clean
Energy and Pollution Reduction Act of 2015.
9. AB 32 EJAC Meeting 8/11-12: The AB 32
Environmental Justice Advisory Committee (Committee) will
be meeting on August 11, 2016 from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm (PDT) and
August 12, 2016 from 9:00 am to 3:30 pm (PDT) in Huron, CA.
10. Financing Tools for Local Gov Webinar 8/25: This
webinar will discuss the various tools and products that the State of
California is making available to local governments to promote clean energy
projects for residents and business owners, and will showcase a new financing
marketplace for finding energy project-related financing solutions. (Go Green
Financing is a program under Energy Upgrade California, administered by the
Center for Sustainable Energy.)
11. PACE’s Value to the Real Estate Market:
Event/Webinar 8/18: This
CEFAC event and webinar will explore the recent amendments to the
residential PACE program, along with updates on consumer protection, regulatory
changes, and market growth in California. Join the Center for Sustainable
Energy for a panel discussion that will cover these topics and validate why
PACE is vital to the residential energy efficiency financing market.
12. EV’s Role in ZNE: Webinar 8/17: The Center
for Sustainable Energy (CSE) invites city and county staff, contractors,
architects, and developers to a free
webinar August 17th on how electric vehicles (EVs) can help
support zero net energy (ZNE) goals.
13. Energy Code Ace Webinar 8/23: We heard
great feedback from local governments on energy code expert Gina Rodda’s
presentation on energy code compliance tools at this year’s SEEC Forum. Now,
Rodda will be teaching a “not-your-average webinar” on what’s
new in the 2016 code in two sessions August 23rd. Get the word
out to your buildings departments!
14. CivicSpark Project Lessons Learned Webinars
8/23-8/24: CivicSpark is a Governor’s Initiative AmeriCorps program that
provides capacity-building support to local governments to accelerate California’s
response and resiliency to climate change. These
webinars aim to provide a snapshot of some of the accomplishments of
the 2015-16 service year, with an emphasis on sharing lessons learned and best
practices.
15. New Integrative Business Model for ZNE: In
the Rocky Mountain Institute’s new Insight
Brief, An Integrative Business Model for Net Zero Energy Districts, RMI
presents an innovative business model for developing net zero energy or
ultra-low energy districts and details how pursuing net zero energy is not a
cost, but rather a significant value driver.
16. EE Shows Its $ Value in SF Real Estate: As
covered by BizJournal’s
July 28th article, funding green upgrades is made easier as the market
shows the value of and desire for energy efficient real estate.
17. California Releases Sustainable Freight Action
Plan: In response to an Executive Order issued by the Governor last year,
the state has released the California
Sustainable Freight Action Plan, a comprehensive document that serves as a
blueprint for transforming the state’s multi-billion dollar freight transport
system into one that is environmentally cleaner, more efficient, and more
economically competitive than it is today.
18. Energy Transition Podcast on EE: In a recent
episode of the Energy Transition Show, Chris Nelder speaks to energy
efficiency expert Matt Golden about raising the profile of energy efficiency,
sharing that energy efficiency (looking nationally) has been disproportionately
neglected considering its extreme value, and also stating that efforts to raise
the profile to date have failed. Matt Golden shares some interesting food for
thought.
19. Job announcement: The San Joaquin Valley
Clean Energy Organization (SJVCEO) is hiring for a Project Analyst! Learn
more here.
20. RFP announcement: The City of San
Jose’s RFP
for Environmental Sustainability Plan Consultant Services closes
August 12th.
As always, you can keep track of relevant events
by connecting to the EE Events Calendar, and find more resources
being added daily on the EECoordinator website – including
past WEEkly Updates.
That’s is all for this week!
Statewide LG EE Best Practices: Weekly Update
Here
are your wEEkly updates:
1.
AB 802 Workshop This Morning!: The California Energy Commission’s workshop
to seek input on draft regulations for implementation of building energy use
data access and public disclosure components of AB 802 is this morning! Get
information to attend in person or by phone/online. The CEC
presentation is now available through the same link.
2.
FHA PACE Guidance Released: This week, the Federal Housing Administration
(FHA) announced
clear guidance that will expand access to renewable energy, energy efficiency,
and other home resiliency projects for American homeowners. The guidance,
signaled last August by President Obama and the FHA, allows residential
Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) assessments to interact with single
family home mortgages secured by the FHA in the event of purchases, refinances,
and loan modifications.
3.
PACE Nation Webinar 7/26: Join PACENation on Tuesday, July 26th for the
webinar "FHA's
PACE Guidance Explained," to discuss HUD/FHA's recent residential PACE
guidance and the White House's new initiative to broaden the scope of
residential PACE. Panelists include Renew Financial CEO Cisco Devries,
PACENation Executive Director David Gabrielson, and more.
4.
PACE Draft Best Practices for Review from DOE: the U.S. Department of
Energy has
released a draft best practices document for residential PACE that
focuses on best practices for program design, including protections to both
consumers who voluntarily opt into PACE programs, and to lenders who hold
mortgages on properties with PACE assessments; compatibility of PACE with other
energy efficiency programs and services; and evaluation of program outcomes,
including cost effectiveness, energy savings, and non-energy benefits such as
improved health and comfort. The comment period for this document is open
through August 19th.
6.
CPUC Evaluation of RENs and LGPs: The California Public Utilities
Commission (CPUC)’s consultants shared their draft research plans for assessing
the impact of California’s two Regional Energy Networks (RENs) and its Local
Government Partnerships (LGPs) in two
webinars this week. The presentations
shared in each are available and the public comment period has been
extended to August 1st.
7.
New options for lighting EE compliance: The California Energy Commission
approved the use of an optional compliance pathway for use in non-residential
lighting alterations that trigger Title 24, Part 6. This is in addition to the
pre-existing two compliance pathways. Learn
more (and share with your buildings stakeholders!).
8.
Updates to GreenPoint Rated Program: Hear from Build It Green on the new
updates to the GreenPoint Rated Program in this
recorded webinar. Public comments are welcome until 7/31.
9.
Local Policies to Support Microgrids: Learn what local
policies can support microgrids from former CPUC Analyst turned
Minnesota PUC Director Chris Villareal – and get some great California (and
national) examples.
10.
California Cities Shine in $5 Million Energy Prize Competition: As shared
by SEEC’s Institute for Local Government (ILG), learn how Berkeley, Chula
Vista, Claremont, Davis, Fremont, Palo Alto, San Mateo and Sunnyvale are
rallying their communities to complete their last year of competition for the
Georgetown University Energy Prize.
11.
Free ZNE Conference 8/19 in Downey: Verdical Group is hosting its 3rd
Annual Net Zero Conference in Downey, CA at SoCal Gas’s Energy
Resource Center on August 19th.
12.
Presentation Proposing RCx, OBF, and HVAC Programming: Southern California
Edison’s presentation from
their 7/14
webinar on their proposed High Opportunity Programs or Projects
(HOPPs) – including public buildings retro-commissioning (RCx), on-bill
financing, and comprehensive commercial HVAC – is now available.
13.
New Study on Data Center EE: Data centers are incredibly energy intensive –
but a new
study shows that some data centers are learning to slim their energy
footprint.
14.
Google Data Center Uses AI to Save: In recent months, the Alphabet Inc.
unit put a DeepMind AI system in control of parts of its data centers to reduce
power consumption by manipulating computer servers and related equipment like
cooling systems – and is seeing some
interesting results.
15.
Seeking Water EE ordinance experience/interest: The Statewide Codes
& Standards team has had a request from a city for resources to implement
efficiency standards for greywater systems and drip irrigation microspray for
trees & shrubs. Reach code options for water-energy issues is new
territory, and the C&S team would appreciate hearing from any other local
governments that are interested in this, or that have experience developing
such standards. Please contact Jordan (jdecker@lgc.org)
and Javier Mariscal (javier.mariscal@sce.com)
if you are a local government and have feedback you can share.
16.
Green Real Estate Interest Survey for Realtors: A number of local
governments engage their builder, developer and realtor communities to connect
on the value of EE. If you are connected to realtors in your jurisdiction,
please help Build It Green distribute
a survey to licensed realtors in California. The survey seeks their feedback on
various green home topics, including a proposal to make green and energy
efficiency features transparent on real estate listing services. You can
forward the survey link to any realtor contacts: https://www.getfeedback.com/r/ys58KCHP.
17.
Testing residential solar+storage: SolarCity and PG&E have announced
a collaborative
demonstration in the San Jose area to see how the coordinated use of
solar smart inverters and behind the meter energy storage could provide
enhanced benefits to the grid.
18.
New report on solar+storage for critical infrastructure: A new
report completed as part of the New York Solar Smart DG Hub-Resilient Solar
Project shows a higher return on investment for solar+storage
combinations for resiliency benefits in critical infrastructure.
19.
Pollution Control Authority New Rules: the California Pollution Control
Financing Authority (CPCFA), chaired by Treasurer John Chiang, has
taken formal action to help large and small businesses in California
keep costs low when financing waste management and recycling projects.
20.
Job announcement: the City and County of San Francisco is hiring for a
Distributed Energy Projects Manager! Learn more here.
That’s all for this week!
Statewide LG EE Best Practices: Weekly Update
Here are your wEEkly updates:
1.
Cap and trade news: On Tuesday, Governor Brown announced a plan led by the
California Air Resources Board (ARB) to extend cap-and-trade beyond its current
expiration in 2020, to 2050. Read
the plan, or get overviews from Utility Dive and
the Los Angeles Times.
2.
AB 802/Benchmarking Developments: California Energy Commission (CEC) staff
will conduct a public workshop to seek input on staff’s proposed draft
regulations to implement the building energy use data access, benchmarking, and
public disclosure provisions of Assembly Bill 802.
3.
AB 802 Background: A prior
CEC workshop on this was March 25th; a partial recap is
available here.
(Refresher on AB 802 available here.)
4.
NBI’s October ZNE Forum: the New Buildings Institute’s “Getting to Zero”
Zero Net Energy Forum this October 12th-14th. Click
to learn more about topics and speakers, and register.
5.
EE Coordinating Committee Updates: The CA EE Coordinating Committee
(CAEECC) had their 7th meeting this week. The agenda, meeting
documents, and how to participate in future meetings is available in this
CAEECC Update summary.
6.
$20M Available from Federal Agencies: Looking
for funding? More than $20 million is available to state, local and
tribal governments for climate change health impacts, coastal ecosystem
resiliency, clean diesel, and climate and agriculture projects.
7.
EE management motivators for business: Promoting energy management to your business
community? This Environmental
Leader article shares some leading reasons that the private
sector is deepening their engagement in energy management - including market
volatility, cost savings and public interest in sound climate and energy
policies.
8.
New technologies for ZNE: The California Energy Commission approved
six grants July 13th focused on energy efficiency with $8 million
awarded for technologies and measures designed to achieve zero net energy (ZNE)
in new affordable housing and multifamily and commercial buildings.
9.
More on zero net energy: At this year’s SEEC Forum, we asked California’s
cities and counties to share with us how they are using innovative technologies
to find deep energy savings in their buildings – and it turned out speakers wanted
to speak to using technology and design to push toward a zero net energy goal.
Learn more about their best practices shared in this CURRENTS article (and
get a link to watch their Forum presentations online!).
10.
Reaching the EJ Community: A number of cities are deepening their focus on
environmental justice issues through the use of target “green zone”
neighborhoods. Learn more about best practices in the use of green zones at
this Statewide
Green Zones Convening event July 28th in Los Angeles.
11.
More on environmental justice and EE: For more on environmental justice
best practices, see this recent CURRENTS article highlighting best
practices shared by California EJ leaders (including why EE is a foundational
EJ community engagement resource).
12.
Sonoma and Woodlake Solar: Congratulations to Sonoma County and Tulare
County’s Woodlake Unified School District for the approval
of California Energy Commission (CEC) loans to install solar
photovoltaics (PV) in their buildings.
13.
Benefits from DERs: A new
study overseen by the CEC in partnership with Southern California
Edison finds over $300 million in benefits from distributed energy resources
(DERs) in the San Joaquin Valley.
14.
Job announcement: The San Luis Obispo County Department of Planning &
Building is offering an exciting career opportunity for Senior Planner in the
Energy unit. Learn
more here.
15.
Job announcements: The City of Chula Vista is inviting applications for the
positions of Senior Conservation Specialist and Recycling Specialist I. Get
descriptions, and links to apply here.