Establishing a Plan to Achieve Energy Code Compliance in Cities, a new resource developed by the City Energy Project, helps guide U.S. city leadership and their building department leadership in working together to implement an effective strategy to achieve high levels of energy code compliance for new and renovated buildings. The document introduces factors responsible … Continued
As the U.S. housing stock ages and energy prices climb, more robust strategies and financing mechanisms are needed to drive energy efficiency renovations in existing homes, particularly among low- and middle-income households. To date, residential retrofit strategies have broadly targeted homeowners, with less emphasis placed on leveraging the home purchase process to trigger renovations early … Continued
Taking a look back at 2013—which was a banner year for IMT with significant developments in each of our program areas—IMT released its first Annual Report. The report highlights key achievements in 2013. We are encouraged that 10 billion square feet of space are now affected by building energy benchmarking policies nationwide—a number that is … Continued
Across the U.S., a growing number of cities are unlocking a wealth of data on the energy performance of buildings in the form of building energy benchmarking programs and policies. By requiring large building owners to track and report the energy use of their properties on a consistent basis, building energy benchmarking provides a growing … Continued
Driven by a need to foster economic development, create jobs, and address environmental concerns, cities are increasingly recognizing the need to encourage investment in building performance with creative financing mechanisms. Making the largest impact possible with limited funds can be challenging. However, cities now have an abundance of governmental and private sector tools available to … Continued
So, you are thinking about retrofitting an existing building or building a new one with green, high performance, and energy-efficient features. What is the best way for you to position your building from a valuation standpoint? Because these buildings are different, owners have had to change not only how they design, build, and market, but also how they approach financing and … Continued
Building energy codes establish minimum requirements for the elements within a building that impact energy consumption. The obvious benefit of buying a new home built in compliance with current energy codes is the energy cost savings for the homeowner. However, there are other significant benefits that come with the purchase of a home built in … Continued
If interest is high in building energy efficiency in the United States, why aren’t investments in efficiency growing? Experts from local and federal governments, the private sector, and non-government organizations explored that question at a June 2013 Roundtable Dialogue in Washington, D.C., convened by the Johnson Controls Institute for Building Efficiency (IBE) and the Institute … Continued
This report presents the results of an impact evaluation of a building energy code training campaign on residential code compliance rates in the state of Nebraska. The authors conducted field inspections on a sample of 42 newly-constructed homes in Nebraska—normalizing, modeling, and comparing the results to a pre-training compliance evaluation. On average the pre-training study … Continued
Achieving scale in the US: A view from the construction and real estate sectors is an Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) paper commissioned by the Global Buildings Performance Network. This paper focuses on how companies in the U.S. approach energy efficiency investments, the challenges and opportunities they face, and the role played by innovative financing in … Continued