Standards for Disclosure of Transactional Energy Use

The last time I heard about Energy Use disclosure for commercial real estate transactions it was in relation with California AB1103: which requires energy use disclosure for commercial real estate transaction. The latest addition to that  is, ASTM standard under development. I read a few articles by major real estate law firms regarding the concerns about inconsistencies/data manipulation possible in energy disclosure. ASTM standard under development ASTM WK24707 : Guide for Building Energy Performance disclosure aims to address those concerns. I feel the current scope of ASTM standard goes beyond mere energy use disclosure to cover applicable energy codes, economic grants and incentives (federal/state), green building certification, carbon footprint and carbon neutrality potential.

For those readers interested in checking out what areas will be covered by the Standard to bring consistency and transparency in the real estate transactional disclosure please check out the link below.

http://www.astmnewsroom.org/default.aspx?pageid=1847

I listened a few hours ago to a Lexis/Nexis (premier law content provider) podcast on the ASTM standards under development. Please click on the link below for the podcast and learn about the potential influence of this upcoming standard!

http://law.lexisnexis.com/practiceareas/Environmental-Law–Climate-Change-Podcast/Environment-Climate/

I am very happy with the development in this sphere, especially since the disclosure will bring in rigor and financial motivation for prospective sellers to make energy efficiency upgrades a priority. It is a kind of economic/financial push to force ambivalent owners/sellers of existing buildings towards greening their buildings. A feather in the hat would have been the inclusion of mandatory Energy Use Label from EPA for existing old buildings under Waxman -Markey Bill. However, real estate industry has used influence to eliminate the mandatory label on existing buildings. At least AB1103/ASTM standard will provide the market based incentives for energy efficiency investments.

http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2009/08/04/04climatewire-the-real-estate-industry-quietly-removes-a-la-8072.html?pagewanted=2

Sheryl Crow and Al Gore at Green Build 2009 in Phoenix

I just read that Sheryl Crow is going to perform at the Green Build 2009 Summit in Phoenix. For me that was a great reason to check the Early bird registration deadline and the cost. Although I am hard pressed for finances at this time, I must admit I was moved a bit towards registration. I jogged my memory a little bit and tried to recall my experiences at Green Build 2008. I then realized that Green Build was a great conference, great talks and technical sessions but needed a bit of entertainment to it much like the Customer Appreciation events hosted by the likes of Cisco, Oracle etc… Green Build is a kind of customer appreciation event, which aims to proliferate, disseminate and propagate LEED rating systems for end users- Government, institutions, schools, private business and home owners.

Another added attraction is the kids entertainment program organized alongside GreenBuild. That is a great concept and will go a long way towards bringing the female LEED proponents to the conference!!

Keep reading.

Just found out that Al Gore is delivering keynote address at Greenbuild 2009. I remember watching ” An Inconvenient Truth” sitting at the edge of my seat.. For me it was the first quantified and visual depiction of climate change in media.  I am sure he will make a compelling and awe inspiring keynote address.

Wireless Mesh networking solutions for demand side energy management

I was at Connectivity Week 2009 in Santa Clara all of last week and found out about the hot topic- Convergence of Energy and IT. I think this convergence translates to Building and IT convergence as well.

Key takeaways for me from the conference:

There is a lot of potential to innovate products, solutions and standards for the next generation of Smart grids.

Vast array of products and solutions have been developed using wireless mesh networking technologies to address the energy management needs in   portfolio of commercial and office buildings. However, we need to exercise caution and engineering and business case judgment before investing in them. Having said that, I do want to let existing building owners, managers and facility professionals know that it is a GREAT opportunity. I plan to do a thorough technical and financial comparison of these products for my own reference.

The conference was full of representatives from Energy, BAS, research and IT world. The average age was I believe >50. We need young Engineers, Architects, Building professionals to shoulder this paradigm shift. I am one of them…

Keep reading. I need to take a tea break.

I would like my audience to check out these wireless energy management product companies listed in alphabetical order.

ARCH Rock:

http://www.archrock.com/products/

Convergence Wireless:

http://www.convergencewireless.com/

Cypress Envirosystems:

http://www.cypressenvirosystems.com/

MillennialNet:

http://www.millennialnet.com/greenrevolution/

Regen Energy:

http://www.regenenergy.com/

BTW, There is a conference organized by UCLA’s WINMEC called  UCLA Smart Grid Leadership Forum. Check out the link below. This roundtable conference will host several leaders from government, industry, and academia.

http://winmec.ucla.edu/smartgrid/2009,

Virtual Energy Forum, Energy Summit, Bay Area Sustainable Expo (June 2009)

Just a quick reminder to my readers about the conferences. There are two events scheduled for June in Silicon Valley:

1. Energy Summit 2009 hosted by Stanford University in collaboration with Silicon Valley Leadership Group. Condoleezza Rice is the keynote speaker for this event.

2. Northern California Facilities Expo (June 3 &4, 2009)

Below are the links if you would like to explore them.

http://bayarea.sustainableexpos.com

http://svlg.net/energysummit/

Hope to see you all at these events. You will be hearing about more learning opportunities… I have more time to write the blog.

Happy reading!

I attended the Bay Area Sustainable Expo for a few hours on the opening day. The opening session speaker was Panama Bartholomy, a gifted speaker, bureaucrat. He gave an enthralling speech on current energy issues in California, how much money is flowing into the State, counties and Cities under the ARRA American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. He suggested we check out the website below:

www.energy.ca.gov/recovery

Another important thing that stuck my memory- How in China,  Solar water heating has become so popular. He showed a photo, with multiple high rise residential towers in China with solar hot water installation. I believe they are available for $120 only.. It is one of the status symbols.

Another session I attended was on Corporate Sustainability Initiatives. A panel discussion by Cisco, Roche, Symantec and JDS. Companies have implemented varied programs and efforts under this umbrella and they are all commendable. Cisco- will reduce 30% GHG emissions by 2012, Symantec will take all its owned buildings through LEED certification besides 3% GHG reduction target. Roche on the other hand has come far along in Corporate Sustainability learning curve- electrical, water, waste conservation. They now have full employee participation. They enjoy behavioral level savings in resource.

http://www.symantec.com/connect/blogs/dow-jones-adds-symantec-sustainability-indexes

http://www.cisco.com/web/about/index.html

http://www.roche.com/principles.htm

Just read about the schedule for the Virtual Energy Forum 2009 (June 24, 25 2009). I attended this Forum last year and was amazed by the depth and knowledge and breadth of the subject matter covered in the conference. Please check this out. You can watch this from your desk, home, coffee shop. It is free and virtual and a great congregation of great minds.

http://www.virtualenergyforum.com/about_us.php

Greenbuild Conference 2008 Boston

Greenbuild 2008 was my first Greenbuild conference. I was pretty amazed to know 30,000 people were expected at the Conference. I did get a proof of that number when I stood in queue for 45 min to get a ride back to my hotel from the Boston Convention Center.

Yes, it was a huge gathering of people from the world of architecture, construction, policy and building marketplace. The venue was beautiful with grand views, short queues for food and amenties, green recycling, great key note speakers and spectacular expo. I especially liked the expo for its breadth and cutting edge display of products and services. I have made a short list of some things that caught my attention. I will share it with my readers later.

Overall, I enjoyed the conference. However, I felt there were too many sessions and conflicting schedules. I wish I had 3 more replicas of me to attend other sessions which were pertinent to my world. I restricted myself to the free sessions. I had no time for the  half day tours, outside the venue sessions and educational paid workshops. I also could not brace myself to face the cold chilly weather! I like warm weather and cold is not for me. However, for those who did not mind the walk in cold, with frost bites did venture out. Incidentally, I met someone at the local USGBC gala dinner, who mentioned about her adventurous frost bit walk back to the downtown.

I will keep writing more about the trip. For now, I will take a break.

Tidbit: next GreenBuild is in Phoenix !!!

Northern California Facilities Expo Santa Clara/ West Coast Green in San Jose

Just to quick reminder to my readers about the conferences. There are 2 happening this week in Silicon Valley; West Coast Green in San Jose ( Sep24-Sep26, 2008) and Northern California Facilities Expo. I will write more about them.

Below are the links if you would like to explore them. The keynote address is by Al Gore on Saturday, Sept 27, 2008 at the West Coast Green.

http://www.westcoastgreen.com/

Unfortunately, I could not visit the conference. I do not have any updates, except that my friend who visited the conference liked it. Another remark I got was that some of the sessions were not so full and attendance was less compared to Eco City World Conference in SFO..

While the Facilities Expo is the free for all expo showcasing the latest products in engineering, facilities management and LEED certification across the landscaping, electrical, mechanical and controls spectrum. The link is below:

http://www.facilitiesexpo.com/fenc/index.po;jsessionid=IQbNm7EdguBPc163w2w__Epj

I visited the Facilities expo for a couple of hours on Wednesday. There was nothing very profound, or outstanding. One thing came to my mind, there were too many cool roofing products and roof installers in the expo. Seems like the cool roof, is catching up. I expect the price competition to intensify to customers can get better products for affordable price. It seems over priced right now.

Dell goes carbon neutral

I just read this article on Yahoo finance, Dell goes carbon neutral. I wondered how that was possible. As per the article, Dell buys 20% renewable energy for its operations and the remaining brown power. While it buys brown power, it offsets that by buying renewable energy credits to offset that power’s carbon emissions. That brings me to a strange quandary. Are we trying to solve, energy crisis or buying our way out of this situation. At the center of the problem is reduction in demand. We need to understand that all our efforts and operations should be towards the goal of reducing the energy consumption and therefore carbon footprint. Although Dell says that it has reduced its energy use by 5%, that is by far less in comparison to a statement saying we are carbon neutral. I would take the statement with a pinch of salt and really look for companies that are reducing their energy demand. We need to focus on the core of the problem and not find out financial shortcut solutions.

I recall from one of the conferences I attended, Adobe was embarking on their goal of becoming carbon neutral. I would buy their argument since they have already certified all their office buildings as Platinum ( highest rating) as per LEED.

Read the article by clicking on the link and let me know your thoughts!

 

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080806/techbit_greening_dell.html?.v=2

LEED EB lamp mercury level calculator

I just started program managing LEED EB project for a facilities management company’s client site in the Silicon Valley. I am very excited about it. I am currently in the information gathering phase.

I found out something interesting which I wanted to share with my readers. One of the MR credits under LEED EBOM require reduction in mercury content of the light bulbs. The manufacturers data usually gives mg/bulb and not the metric which LEED looks for which is Hg in picograms per lumen hour. There is an LEED EB online calculator available from Philips which can help people calculate the metric and compare across various models and manufacturers. I have not tried this tool but would recommend if you are trying to make a policy or selection.

The link below will take you to the calculator.

http://www.nam.lighting.philips.com/us/pro_lighting/sustain_calc.php

Keep coming back! I will write more stuff as time permits.

Time is really becoming precious now. As I get neck deep in LEED EBOM, I have more stuff to write and less time to write. Strange paradox! So today, I wanted to share with my readers the frustration I experience at work because USGBC has not come out with the latest reference guide for LEED EB O&M. We often put items on hold and say we will revisit this when the reference guide is out. I do not find that situation very productive.

Want to hire a Green Building Consultant?

As I get ready to venture into the green building industry, I find many green building/ sustainable building consultants. Just thought of creating a ready to use list which I might need in the future. I will try and create some kind of categories, in terms of their geography, building type, market segment. At the moment I will just list them.

Green Building Services, OR (USA):
http://www.greenbuildingservices.com/

Encraft, (UK)

http://www.encraft.co.uk/ws/P/Organisation/HomePage.php

Davis Langdon (UK)

http://www.davislangdon.com/EME/Services/SustainableServices/AboutSustainabilityServices/

Yudelson Associates, AZ (USA) consulting for marketing, project and program development, research reports/ studies as well as green building services. They have authored a survey based report on local government incentives for green building Green Building Incentives That Work: A Look at How Local Governments Are Incentivizing Green Development

http://www.greenbuildconsult.com/

Brightworks OR, (USA)

http://www.brightworks.net

KEMA (USA)

http://www.kema.com/consulting_services/cross_sector/green_building_consulting/

Green Ideas AZ, (USA)

http://www.egreenideas.com/

I-Kan NY, (USA)

http://www.ikanbegreen.com/

Simon and Associates CA (USA)

http://www.greenbuild.com/

Two Trails Inc, (USA)

http://www.greenbuildingconsultant.com/services.html

Paladino and Co, WA (USA)

http://www.paladinoandco.com/index.html

O’Brien & Company, WA(USA)

http://www.obrienandco.com/gpc.htm

CTG Energetics multiple offices CA, NV, VA (USA)

http://www.ctg-net.com/energetics/Default.aspx

EE Initiative: specifically for energy efficiency in commercial buildings. Partners with utility companies and commercial real estate professional for achieving energy efficiency. Uses both Energy Star Portfolio Manager benchmarking or LEED certification for achieving the goal.

http://eeinitiative.com/index.html

Enovity Inc multiple offices CA, AZ and WA( USA): Provide commissioning, retro-commissioning, energy engineering and sustainable design and building operations and maintenance services. They have some rebate offering for retro-commissioning ( subject to eligibility requirements) which may be of interest to property owners or building facility managers.

http://www.enovity.com/index.html

Building Wise LLC, Santa Cruz(CA): independent LEED EB and sustainability consulting. Co-founders, Dan Ackerstein and Barry Gilles, are seasoned LEED EB consultant, technical reviewer and faculty with USGBC.

Edu Tracks, Fairfax (CA): specializes in Green Building & Sustainability Education

http://www.edutracks.com/

SEPartners, San Francisco, (CA): I just came across another green consulant in the Facilities Expo in Santa Clara, Sept 24, 2008. They are called the Sustainable Energy Partners (SEP) based  in SFO. They provide Clean energy consulting services.

http://SEPartners.com

My list of green buildings consultants is growing. I was at the Greenbuild Conference Nov19-21, 2008 in Boston last week. I went to the booth set up by Constellation Energy. Another energy sector consulting company. They provide energy consulting, carbon neutrality consulting, performance contracting for energy upgrades, energy procurement such as RECs, PPA, demand response etc.

http://www.constellation.com/portal/site/constellation/

HOMES:

Seville consulting:

http://www.sevilleconsulting.com/

Magrann Associates:

http://www.magrann.com/green-building.cfm

Practica Consulting for residential/multifamily:

http://www.practicaconsulting.com/team.html

Environmental Building Strategies for Single/Multi Family Residential and Revitalization projects: Offices in SF, LA (CA) and Aspen (CO).

http://www.ebsconsultants.net/contact.php

Carbon footprint calculators

I have come across quite a few carbon footprint /energy /pollution calculators. I decided to write this post and create a working list. Consumer specific calculators are very basic and simple and give the end user just a sense of fossil fuel use.

Pollution calculator is a slightly different concept. Based on your electricity bill, state you live in, building type- residential, commercial etc, you can get your contribution to pollution in GHG emissions (CO2), SO2, NOx and Hg

http://www.cleanerandgreener.org/resources/pollutioncalculator.htm

Carbon calculator from “An Inconvenient Truth” uses information on lifestyle, no of flights, car used, household size, location and energy bill to calculate tonnes of Co2 per year.

http://www.climatecrisis.net/takeaction/carboncalculator/

EPA’s Energy Star Home Energy Yardstick is another calculator for a regular homeowner. If you have one year’s energy bills, zipcode, sqft, age of house, type of energy source, you can calculate your home’s energy performance. I have tried this tool, it is very easy, user friendly and intuitive. The result will tell you how you compare to average in that area.

http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?fuseaction=home_energy_yardstick.showStep2

I recently went to a lectures series called Personal, Professional and Political Climate solutions. I found out about the EPA’s Energy Star calculator. This is an advanced energy management tool for buildings called the Portfolio Manager. The tool uses similar building type data to benchmark energy performance. If you have the energy data (energy meters data), gross floor area and other operational data of the building you can benchmark energy performance of your building. It gives performance on a scale of 1-100 ( percentile performance) as compared to similar buildings nationwide. Energy Star Buildings rating 75 or more may qualify for the Energy Star label. However, a qualified PE has to come out to your building, verify your data and approve your building for Energy Star label. I have not tried Portfolio Manager myself since I do not own any building! Intuitively I feel it is easy to follow and fill out. I found out about this quick reference guide for Portfolio Manager and wanted to share this info. Quick reference guide gives step by step directions to using Portfolio Manager. Check out the second link

http://www.energystar.gov/index.cfm?c=evaluate_performance.bus_portfoliomanager

http://eeinitiative.com/db4/00391/eeinitiative.com/_download/EnergyStarQuickReferenceGuide.pdf

This post has become very exciting as I discover/learn more than I thought. I think this post will evolve and grow. The short list I have thus far is a good start.

So I am here again to reinforce my list. Thanks to the comment from Pranay, I checked out this calculator with cool graphics and very user friendly interface. There is one initial hurdle. You need to register yourself with Encraft, based in UK, to access or play around with the tool. They ask for address, email, phone. I liked this personal calculator’s very vivid graphics. You need input data pertaining to home-electricity/natural/ oil annual usage, public transport, private transport(cars), flights(domestic,long haul, european). The output graph tracks CO2 emissions by these 4 principal categories suggesting an end user areas of action. The graph also gives qualitative performance which wows you! Am I a beast/earth savior! Check it out…

http://www.encraft.co.uk

I was reading an article in Mercury news and found out 4 new carbon calculators online. Most of them are simple and easy for common people. Most of them also give the option of buying carbon offset if you plan to offset carbon emissions due to a planned vacation or your entire calendar year of living.

The carbon calculator from Environmental Defense (non profit working for environmental justice/ problems) is a simple one that takes into account your state, type of building (single family vs apt), no of household members, car type and vehicle miles per year, air trips and gives an outcome. The result is compared to average American footprint. I tried this tool and found that air flights were the biggest portion of my footprint. Try this out and find new ways to change your lifestyle.

http://www.fightglobalwarming.com/carboncalculator.cfm

The second calculator is from Native Energy’s carbon emissions calculator . This is a simple one that calculated in 3 different categories: Driving, Flying and Rail/Bus. You can calculate carbon emissions in these 3 categories separately and add them up in the final step. They calculate emissions by start and end destinations or mileage ( if you know the values!). At the end of this exercise you have the option to purchase carbon offset which they claim is third party verified. Carbon offsets buying and selling is another topic in itself. I do not want to write about the verification process and authenticity of these offerings.

http://www.nativeenergy.com/pages/travel_calculator/30.php

The third calculator I found is from Climate Trust - a non profit that buys high quality green house gas offsets through contracted purchases from different projects on behalf of funders and sells them. The Personal calculator is simple and with user appealing graphics in 3 segments: Home, Auto and Air Travel. On the Home front you need to input state, home type (single family vs apt), home size. Auto category needs no of vehicles and type of vehicle. Air Travel asks for the no of total hours you fly in a year. The result gives your total emissions and the option to offset the emissions through donations to support projects that reduce CO2 from the atmosphere. Example of a solution is: $12.00 per ton of CO2, I could offset the amount of CO2 emitted in a year by donating to projects that offset emissions in a monthly donation or yearly amount to offset the full footprint. I will not go into the details of this offset calculation. Check out the link for this calculator.

http://www.carboncounter.org/offset-your-emissions/personal-calculator.aspx

There is another calculator from a UK company called Climate Care. The tool calculates emissions from Flights and cars. Flights calculation uses start and end destination info. And offers carbon offset @ pound 7.5 per tonne of CO2 plus VAT.

http://www.climatecare.org/

So I found out about another carbon footprint calculator. This seems like a never ending list. Every non profit or profit working in the climate change/ carbon offset market seem to have their version of a carbon footprint calculator . This one is from 3Degrees. I found out about them from Virtual Energy Forum, they are marketers, sellers of RECs (renewable energy certificates) and third party certified carbon offset. They calculate the footprint in three categories: Home electricity, Car travel and Air travel. You need to input Kwh use every month or type of your house (sqft/type); car manufacturer, model name and year; air travel domestic and international. This calculates carbon footprint for the year. Again, the graphics are simple and user friendly.

http://www.3degreesinc.com/carbon_calculator/index.php