The General Services Administration High Performance Building Adoption Task Group, an advisory committee of both federal and nonfederal experts, has released a letter with a set of recommendations to accelerate the adoption of high-performance federal buildings, focusing on upgrading existing buildings.

The letter advised projects to adopt national standards, such as the Investor Confidence Project (ICP), a global underwriting standard for developing and measuring energy efficiency retrofits for commercial and multifamily residential buildings. ICP is administered by GBCI and was conceived, incubated and developed by the Environmental Defense Fund as a way to leverage and replicate best practices in the public and private sector.
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The recommendations to the GSA centered around addressing transaction cost barriers, as well as streamlining the project development and contracting process to create confidence and consistency in project returns. The committee also discussed mechanisms to allow energy performance contracting and energy efficiency to reach smaller buildings that are often too small for most Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP) contractors.

The ICP system and its Investor Ready Energy Efficiency™ (IREE) certification addresses many of the core issues that have made it hard to scale energy efficiency across diverse portfolios of buildings. By standardizing how projects are developed and reviewed, it becomes easier to roll out efficiency with confidence, ensuring consistent quality with lower transaction costs. The ICP system specifically works to increase investor and building owners confidence in the financial and environmental performance of commercial and multifamily buildings.

ICP’s recognition by the GSA advisory group follows on the heels of a report from a committee of Canada’s House of Commons, the Canadian Federal Standing Committee on Finance, that also included ICP as a tool to drive opportunities for targeted retrofit investments for federally funded buildings. The report, “Driving Inclusive Growth: Spurring Productivity and Competitiveness in Canada,” encourages projects to embed ICP as a requirement in the Low-Carbon Economy Fund, the Canada Infrastructure Bank and the National Housing Strategy, three of the central Canadian governmental programs to address energy use in buildings.
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This combined effort is an indication of ICP’s ability to deliver a consistent approach to energy efficiency retrofitting across markets. Having a standard framework that is consistent in the United States and Canada will help create a more efficient market that will benefit building owners, investors and the efficiency industry. To learn more about ICP and IREE certification, visit the ICP website or contact us via email.

The Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC) is pleased to see the Federal  Standing Committee on Finance pre-budget consultation report (Driving Inclusive Growth: Spurring productivity and competitiveness in Canada) includes recommendations for zero carbon buildings, targeted retrofits for federally-owned buildings and green skills development.
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Among recommendations originally proposed by CaGBC, the Government is specifically recommending adopting zero carbon building standards and creating opportunities for targeted retrofit investments for federally-owned buildings. To this end, the government says it should buy zero carbon technology in bulk, and embed the Investor Confidence Project (ICP) as a requirement in the Low-Carbon Economy Fund, the Canada Infrastructure Bank, and the National Housing Strategy.

The Federal recommendations also include targeted investments in skills development to strengthen apprenticeship and training programs in order to ensure sufficient labour resources to meet the evolving needs of the economy, including support for green trades.

“We are encouraged to see our recommendations supported in the Standing Committee’s pre-budget consultation report,” says Thomas Mueller, President and CEO of the CaGBC. “In recognizing the importance of green jobs training, building investor confidence in retrofits, and pursuing zero carbon performance, the federal government is demonstrating leadership in the development of Canada’s low carbon economy. We look forward to continuing our work with the Government to deliver on these efforts.”

In May 2017, CaGBC released Canada’s first Zero Carbon Building Standard, a world-class program that positions Canada as a global leader, offering designers and operators the opportunity to make carbon reduction the key indicator for building performance.

Spearheaded in Canada by CaGBC, GBCI and MaRS Discovery District, ICP is a global underwriting standard for developing and measuring energy efficiency retrofits. Its Investor Ready Energy Efficiency certification (IREE) signals to investors that a project has adopted best practices that can help reduce transaction costs and increase savings. The protocols offer investors a consistent roadmap for assessing risk and expected outcomes from deep retrofits.

CaGBC’s Education Strategy is focused on increasing capacity in the Canadian green building industry through the development and delivery of specialized education, including zero carbon building education. CaGBC offers zero carbon building education for the trades through the delivery of its Green Professional Building Skills Training (GPRO). It also offers professional courses focused on CaGBC’s Zero Carbon Building Program.

The Canada Green Building Council (CaGBC), Green Business Certification Inc. (GBCI), and the Advanced Energy Centre at MaRS Discovery District (MaRS) announced today that they are working together to bring the Investor Confidence (ICP) Project and its Investor Ready Energy Efficiency (IREE) certification to Canada.

ICP is a global underwriting standard for developing and measuring energy efficiency retrofits and is administered by GBCI. Its IREE certification signals to investors that a project has adopted best practices that can help reduce transaction costs and increase savings. The protocols offer investors a consistent roadmap for assessing risk and expected outcomes from deep retrofits.

The IREE certification is currently being used by project owners, investors, engineers and insurance companies in North America and Europe. Energy efficiency programs such as Pacific Gas and Electric’s On-Bill Financing Program, the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities Pay4Performance Program, the Connecticut Green Banks Commercial Property Assessed Clean Energy program, the United Kingdom’s Carbon and Energy Fund and others are also applying the IREE certification.

In the Pan-Canadian Framework, the Canadian federal government recognized the role that retrofitting buildings will play in reaching Canada’s targeted emissions reductions. The CaGBC and GBCI are bringing ICP to Canada to facilitate the mass retrofits required to achieve these goals. The IREE-certified projects will provide clarity on the long-term performance of energy efficiency technologies and provide the necessary assurance required to create greater access to competitive financing which will be necessary to achieve retrofits on a large scale.

“As our recent A Roadmap for Retrofits in Canada report found, Canada’s existing building stock has the potential to reduce overall building emissions by up to 51 per cent by 2030. The biggest barrier for the industry and ownership is access to financing,” says Thomas Mueller, President and CEO of the CaGBC and GBCI Canada. “We believe that the ICP can play a critical role in the acceleration of Canada’s retrofit economy by instilling investor confidence in green retrofits and by providing a tested, ready-made tool that government and industry can leverage to accelerate uptake across the country.”

Supported by the Ministry of Energy in Ontario, the Advanced Energy Centre at MaRS is partnering with CaGBC and GBCI to pilot the ICP methodology for the Canadian market. The pilot will bring together a multi-sectoral group that includes owners, government, engineering firms, utilities and financial institutions with the goal of determining how ICP can help facilitate more retrofits in Canada. The pilots will also help inform the accreditation and certification services for Investor Ready Energy Efficiency projects, which will be delivered by GBCI Canada. 

 “The Advanced Energy Centre is pleased to play a role in introducing the Investor Confidence Project and supporting the IREE Certification’s launch in Canada,” says Shawn Peterson, Senior Associate of the Advanced Energy Centre at MaRS. “Our cities need innovative financing mechanisms for improving building performance at scale. Ontario’s large concentration of institutional real estate, financial capital and support to invest in low-carbon building solutions makes it an ideal market for investors.”

The next steps for the ICP program in Canada will be the recruitment of Canadian projects for IREE certification in February 2018, and then the initiation of a pilot in summer 2018. For more information on ICP in Canada, visit the MaRS Discovery District website.

ICP continues to be integrated into more programs across the nation as a growing number of programs in New Jersey, Connecticut, California, Texas, and other states recognize the value that ICP brings to programs which includes:

• Industry tested best practices and a pathway to success for participants
• Reduced costs to implement and maintain technical requirements
• Quicker processing of project reviews and program approvals
• Access to ready made networks of project developers, QA providers, and investors
• Ability to easily transition to market-based solutions for technical reviews.
• Increased confidence in savings by owners and investors resulting in increased program uptake

 
If you are in PG&E territory and interested in learning how to take advantage of this unique opportunity which offers up to $4m of funding please register for this event and/or add the August 23rd 2017 event to your calendar.  If you would like to learn more about becoming an ICP Credentialed Provider, how ICP can apply to programs in other territories, or about ICP’s Investor Ready Energy Efficiency Certification please contact ICP.

We are pleased to announce the release of three ICP Protocols in the Bulgarian, German and Portuguese languages, now available through the ICP Europe website.

The Energy Performance Protocols are the cornerstone of the ICP System. They define a standardised roadmap of best practices for developing energy retrofits following the ICP Project lifecycle. They leverage existing and commonly accepted European and national standards in conjunction with ICP specified elements, procedures, and documentation based on the various stages of a project life-cycle to create standardised projects with reliable returns.

The ICP Protocols cover commercial (tertiary) and multifamily (apartment block) building energy efficiency projects. The first IREE™ project, an NHS three-building hospital in Liverpool, UK, was certified in June 2016 and used the ICP Standard Tertiary Protocol. Since then project developers, funds and frameworks have started using ICP Protocols in projects in the UK, Germany, Portugal and Austria.

If you’d like to learn more about the ICP System and how to use the Protocols in your country, don’t hesitate to contact the appropriate national contact. 

Environmental Defense Fund’s Investor Confidence Project (ICP) recently announced Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E), the largest utility in the United States, has received approval from the California Public Utilities Commission to accelerate energy efficiency retrofits in existing buildings by providing interest-free loans to projects that follow ICP’s rigorous protocols. ICP Protocols define industry best practices for energy efficiency project development and a credentialing system that includes third-party validation.

“Together, ICP and PG&E are welcoming a new era of market-driven energy efficiency performance,” said Matt Golden, Project Director for EDF’s Investor Confidence Project. “By establishing a series of benchmarks and best practices for the retrofitting of existing buildings, ICP slashes transaction costs, accelerates project timelines, and shows a clear path to profitability for the finance and performance contracting sectors.”

Customers participating in PG&E’s On-Bill Financing program, which provides interest-free loans for energy efficiency projects, can now make upgrades based on measured energy savings via SmartMeter™ technology. For this new pilot, customers will work with energy performance contractors who use ICP’s Investor Ready Energy Efficiency™ (IREE) certification. This certification brings rigorous measurement and verification metrics to energy efficiency retrofit projects, standardizing the way such projects are developed and brought to market — and making them more attractive to investors and building owners alike.

 PG&E’s On-Bill Financing program offers qualifying businesses interest-free loans ranging from $5,000 to $100,000, or up to $250,000 for government agencies. Supporting the energy efficiency provisions of recent California state legislation Assembly Bill 802, this new On-Bill Financing pilot could increase investment in energy efficiency retrofits across California, and provide a model for similar efforts in other states.

“Standardization is key to attracting the capital necessary to meet energy efficiency’s true potential, achieve climate targets, and generate financial returns,” said Andy Darrell, chief of strategy for global energy and finance at EDF. “PG&E’s new pilot with EDF’s Investor Confidence Project is a step toward making the vision of bringing energy efficiency to market a reality.”

EDF’s Investor Confidence Project, which came to fruition in 2014, is also running a pilot through the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (NJBPU), and is the standard for property-assessed clean energy loans (PACE) in the state of Texas. Additional ICP programs for building owners, investors, and performance contractors exist in a half-dozen other states in the U.S. and across the European Union.
 For more information on the Investor Confidence Project, visit www.EEperformance.org.