In most major cities across the country, businesses are required to benchmark their energy use. Benchmarking is mandated as it helps businesses operate their buildings with the least amount of wasted energy.
The city of Columbus, Ohio realizes the benefit of benchmarking and is encouraging businesses to reap these benefits as well. Therefore, the City has created the Columbus Energy Challenge. This is a free, voluntary program that makes achieving energy efficiency as easy as possible, from start to finish. Each participating business is provided with quality information about energy benchmarking, training opportunities, tutorials on how to register buildings using ENERGY STAR® Portfolio Manager®, and a spreadsheet template that makes automatically uploading utility data easy. Participants are also connected to utility rebates and other resources to save money and help reduce energy usage.
Incentives
Some of the incentives available to building owners include the Energy-Efficient Commercial Buildings Tax Deduction. A tax deduction of $1.80 per square foot is available to owners of new or existing buildings who install:
(1) interior lighting
(2) building envelope
(3) heating, cooling, ventilation, or hot water systems that reduce the building’s total energy and power cost by 50% or more in comparison to a building meeting minimum requirements set by ASHRAE Standard 90.1-2007.
Deductions of $0.60 per square foot are available to owners of buildings in which individual lighting, building envelope, or heating and cooling systems meet target levels that would reasonably contribute to an overall building savings of 50% if additional systems were installed.
Albireo Can Help
As a professional energy manager, Albireo has helped businesses in cities such as Boston, Philadelphia, and Washington D.C. fulfill their benchmarking requirements. Albireo has the deep market expertise and state-of-the-art technology to help you become benchmarking compliant, find energy saving solutions, and make energy purchasing a breeze. Contact us at [email protected] or call us today at 800-201-3153. Let Albireo power your business.
