Existing Building Maintenance and Retrofits Are Key to National Energy Savings
With the stalling state of the economy appearing in and out of the headlines in 2011, there continues to be a growing emphasis on building cost-savings and efficiency measures . For example, earlier this year President Obama pushed the importance of commercial building energy efficiency and setting specific new targets with his “Better Buildings Initiative.” The program’s goal is to increase the energy efficiency of America’s commercial buildings by 20 percent by the year 2020. The methods include a combination of tax incentives for building retrofits, new loans to finance the retrofits, a competitive grant program for state and municipal governments, a “better buildings challenge” for corporate building owners, and a “construction technology partnership” to help prepare construction companies and workers to complete all of these retrofitting projects.
Did you notice a running theme among those items? It’s the importance of maximizing the energy efficiency of existing buildings. This represents what’s by far the greatest opportunity for energy savings. That’s why we have LEED-EB (LEED for Existing Buildings) and other, similar programs that focus our attention on this gold mine of opportunities.
Retrofit Video:
Think back to when we blogged about an extensive retrofit project for the Empire State Building. Well, here’s a great video that shares some of the project’s insider details:
Your Next HVAC Purchase?
Click to activate a 10% coupon or insert the coupon code 10PERCENT upon checkout.
Read full blog post »
