Buildings

Recent college grads and young adults beware, the rental/home buying process can be a difficult one - unless you’ve got some guidance. Sure, finally moving out of your parents’ house, and living with some of your best friends can be a wonderful experience, but actually looking for a home is where the real challenge lies.

Recently five collaborating Regional Energy Efficiency Organizations (REEOs) - NEEP, MEEA, SPEER, SWEEP and SEEA - published a white paper entitled, “Multifamily Energy Efficiency Retrofits: Barriers and Opportunities for Deep Energy Savings.” The paper, supported by a grant from the MacArthur Foundation, is a comprehensive exploration of the barriers and opportunities to increasing energy efficiency through the retrofit of multifamily buildings.

Picture yourself as an energy manager for a large portfolio of buildings. You are responsible for monitoring and reducing energy consumption in these buildings to reduce energy costs. You have just learned that you will be responsible for achieving a 20% energy reduction portfolio-wide over the next 5 years. Excited to dig in to this work, you decide to request the utility bills for all of the buildings over the last two years.

Working in the field of energy efficiency, there are days when it’s hard to see or feel the exact impact of our work. Last week was different, though. It was a great reminder that the work we do matters and that we are making a big impact, especially in learning environments.  

Here’s a hypothetical situation (perhaps a strictly hypothetical one if you’re a millennial like me):

In the past four years, have states in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic region become more supportive of zerio energy policies and construction? What have those states done since NEEP first released it's Roadmap to Zero Net Energy Public Buildings report?

To answer these questions, NEEP recently released the Roadmap to Zero Energy Public Buildings: Progress Report (The Progress Report).

With Opening Day about to ring in another season of me rooting for my hometown New York Yankees while embedded in Red Sox Nation here at NEEP, I made the following realization: our region is the Yankees of building high efficiency homes. Think about it:

Rental horror stories, we’ve all got one. Whether it’s you or someone you know, it’s common to hear tales about moving into a new apartment or home and being caught off guard by some feature in the house that leads to skyrocketing energy costs or an uncomfortable living situation. Mine goes like this:

Before last week, I (like most) had never stepped foot in a high performance school. It wasn’t futuristic in terms of its aesthetics, no chrome-plated walls or robots roving through the corridors. However, it was futuristic in the sense that it carefully considered the health of the students, their learning atmosphere, and our environment as a whole.

Over 900 stakeholders from around the country gathered last week in Washington D.C. to showcase the accomplishments made thus far in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Better Buildings Initiative. The initiative was launched by President Obama in 2011 with the goal of reducing national building energy usage by 20% over ten years.