The House of Representatives recently passed energy and climate legislation that would include a number of provisions for green building incentives. The Waxman-Markey bill, otherwise known as the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (H.R. 2454), would include such things as:
-A building retrofit program, which would include standards for both residential and nonresidential buildings;
-A building energy performance labeling program, which would encourage both owners and occupants to learn about building energy performance;
-Established percentage targets for energy use reductions in new residential and commercial buildings;
-The GREEN (Green Resources for Energy Efficient Neighborhoods) Act, which includes provisions related to residential energy efficiency.
For a detailed summary of the legislation, as established by the USGBC, click here.
NMHC has analyzed the apartment-related provisions in the bill, noting “unrealistic code mandates,” “federal cause of action against property owners,” ‘building energy usage labeling requirements,” and “renewable energy requirements” as just some of the potential problems multifamily firms could face if the bill is passed into law.
In the analysis, NMHC points out, “code-based conservation proposals put extreme pressure on apartment firms to invest in expensive upgrades without significantly improving overall building energy performance.” As the Council observes, most of the energy used in multi-housing is not covered by the legislation, so meeting the levels would require not only upgrades to the building envelope and HVAC systems but also lighting, appliances, etc.
Click here for NMHC’s full analysis.
What do you think? Does this appear to be a “one size fits all” legislation that, once again, does not take multifamily buildings into account as a special case? Or is it a start in the right direction?
Share your thoughts. Email me at Erika.Schnitzer@nielsen.com.
While the proposed climate/energy bills are both broad and bold, they are not a disaster for multifamily properties. The author’s clarion call might be closer to right if the bills were all stick and no carrot. In fact, most investments to increase MF buildings’ energy efficiency would produce a payback by increasing property values. But beyond that, the states are encouraged to provide funding to assist with the transition, and the current ARRA funding has tens of billions of dollars that can be accessed for just that purpose.
Also, while it is true that one could “invest in expensive upgrades without significantly improving overall building energy performance,” that would only happen if the owner approached that investment in a manner wholly different from the way all other investments are approached in this sector. In fact, a seasoned energy efficiency consultant can often show a MF property owner how to get deep energy savings (20%-40%) at a cost that (a) is often right in line with what utility programs will rebate, and (b) would deliver a payback in under three years even if there aren’t any rebates.
Given that virtually every other building sector has improved energy efficiency in the past thirty years dramatically more than the multifamily sector, it is time to catch up, to be part of the solution for air quality and energy affordability issues, and to put the tremendous brain-power in this industry to work on meeting a goal of eliminating all wasteful use of energy in our buildings. Plenty of financial and programmatic solutions are already being implemented in various locations in the U.S. Instead of complaining about “unrealistic code mandates,” let’s explore instead how we can do MORE than just our part for the economy, environment and working families of America. …and make more money doing so.
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