Your program is humming along, meeting its goals, but you and your customers are hearing scientists say that we’ll need reductions of 30, 50, or 80 percent in greenhouse gas emissions in order to avoid the worst effects of global climate change. States legislators are hearing those reports as well, and many states are starting to take action. Your state may be one of those that’s starting to think about goals such as zero net energy construction.

Other organizations are already addressing this topic. The American Association of Architects and the U.S. Green Building Council (who establishes LEED^® criteria) recently came to a public agreement to collaborate on projects that will move construction towards carbon neutral buildings by 2030.

While the design community can educate, establish rating systems, and influence decision makers, to actually impact the market is another issue. Carbon neutrality is a huge goal, a stretch goal, and meeting it on a large scale will often fall to efficiency program administrators. How would you go about reaching a goal such as zero net energy construction?

You’ve probably heard about the Big Bold initiative in California. Cathy Fogel from the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) explained how California is planning for stretch goals at the CEE-ACEEE Market Transformation Symposium in late March. The Big Bold initiatives are an offshoot of California’s commitment to reducing greenhouse gases 80 percent by 2050, a commitment passed into law in the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006.

Step one was for investor-owned and public utilities to work with other stakeholders to develop an energy efficiency plan for the entire state. While the plan addresses all sectors and all fuels, a particular focus is on these four initiatives:

• Residential New Construction. All new residential construction in California will be zero net energy by 2020.
• Commercial New Construction. All new commercial construction in California will be zero net energy by 2030.
• Residential and Small Commercial HVAC. Heating, ventilating and air conditioning will be reshaped for optimal equipment performance.
• Low Income Energy Efficiency. All eligible low income homes will be energy efficient by 2020.

A key feature directing the Big Bold initiatives is the loading order of preferred resources. Energy efficiency and conservation are first, followed by demand response and advanced metering. Renewable generation is third, followed by the cleanest available fossil resources.

Fogel made three points about the infrastructure needed to support the Big Bold initiative:

1. A policy context that supports efficiency initiatives
2. Strong public-private partnerships
3. Deep analysis of emissions and mitigation solutions

Analysis of Emissions and Mitigation
In order to reduce emissions 80 percent, California needed to know where the emissions were coming from. The CPUC analyzed sectors for emissions from both gas and electric, and for potential savings. They then looked at market penetration of efficiency in each area and whether that sector presented an opportunity that would not otherwise occur. The resulting analysis found Big and Bold energy savings in residential and commercial construction, HVAC, and low income housing, resulting in the initiatives described above.

Residential efficiency is the first initiative to get underway with a focus on Big Bold Energy Efficiency Strategy (BBEES) HVAC. Local government plays a role in market transformation through education and outreach. California is also working on training and work force development (See Green Collar Jobs).

The commercial sector initiative rests on aggressive enhancement and enforcement of building energy codes and standards, improving operations and maintenance practices, and aligning commercial building labels with meeting the operations and maintenance benchmarks. In addition, the initiative is focused on developing innovative financing tools to overcome first cost objections. The last piece of the commercial building strategy is to work with the building industry to develop better design tools.

All in all, California is taking steps that could shift markets elsewhere in the country and could change the way other efficiency programs do business. As California moves toward its first benchmark in 2013, CEE members will continue to exchange ideas, techniques, and information with these pioneers.

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