by Glenn Kingsbury
Building owners planning energy retrofit projects have the bottom-line concern of improving their building’s energy performance; that is, lowering energy consumption and operating costs. Above all, they seek to have a performance guarantee of the energy savings the retrofit project will achieve. The National Electrical Contractors Association (NECA) has come up with an answer to their concerns. NECA’s Energy Conservation and Performance Platform (ECAP), is a program specially designed to provide NECA members and their clients with turnkey access surety and financing solutions for energy upgrade projects.
Commercial building energy retrofits can encompass upgrading various aspects of a building’s systems to improve the facility’s energy performance and operating cost. Projects can include energy-efficient lighting upgrades, power and electrical distribution upgrades, renewable energy installations, HVAC building automation enhancements, data center upgrades, and more. Key considerations for the building owner in undertaking an energy retrofit project are, invariably, cost and performance guarantees.
The NECA ECAP program removes the obstacles associated with the implementation of planned energy retrofit projects by seamlessly integrating performance guarantees and flexible financing solutions into the project. NECA ECAP allows owners to undertake energy conservation projects that come with performance guarantees and that will increase their building’s property value. And, the ECAP program eliminates the need to borrow or invest money and also eliminates engaging a third-party engineer.
So how does the NECA energy conservation and performance plan achieve this? The NECA ECAP’s project development work-flow streamlines the development process to align the project sales, engineering, underwriting, and financing efforts.
The platform was successfully launched nationwide in 2014 and is currently being introduced by NECA contractors to their clients for commercial, educational, healthcare, and public facility retrofit projects throughout New England.
Electrical contractors offer the solutions for all emerging technologies that affect building performance, operating costs and occupant productivity. And, NECA has been at the forefront of researching, developing, and initiating sustainable energy practices that make a real difference in property management costs.
To learn more about the NECA Energy Conservation and Performance Platform, visit http://www.necanet.org/
Glenn Kingsbury is executive manager, NECA Boston Chapter.
