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July 2004
Grand Opening at the Morrison Lakeside Project, a Building America, Zero Energy Home Program project, in the CEEP jurisdiction of Elk Grove, California. From left to right: Mark Ginsberg, U.S. DOE EERE Board of Directors; Rob Hammon, ConSol, BIRA lead; Terry Bales, VP Sales and Marketing, Morrison Homes; Genevieve Shiroma, Director, Sacramento Municipal Utilities District; Robert Pernell, Commissioner, California Energy Commission; Lew Pratsch, U.S. DOE EERE Manager Zero Energy Homes Program.
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Housing shortages in southern and northern California are spurring new construction, prompting concerns about energy efficiency in both regions.
Southern California has had considerable success addressing energy efficiency issues with the help of the Building Industry Institute (BII) Community Energy Efficiency Program (CEEP), a voluntary energy efficiency initiative between homebuilders and local governments. Supported by Southern California Edison (SCE), CEEP signs up local governments to provide incentives to builders who agree to exceed local building code requirements by more than 15%, which also exceeds ENERGY STAR® standards.
In contrast, northern California's energy efficiency needs were largely unmet because the CEEP team lacked the needed resources to assist them. Recently, however, the U.S. Department of Energy funded the Building Industry Research Alliance (BIRA) to enroll and support three northern California local governments in CEEP. For the first time, CEEP was able to reach out to northern California, enrolling five local governments, exceeding its goal for DOE.
Selection was based on the number of new residential construction permits issued by the jurisdiction, geographic location, and the support of local government leaders and homebuilders for green building.
The five cities enrolled are Elk Grove, Fairfield, Lincoln, Modesto, and Tracy. The CEEP team provided valuable technical assistance, marketing materials, and briefing papers to each new government member enabling the cities to provided incentives, such as special recognition, faster plan checks, and reduced or waived fees to builders for building to CEEP standards.
CEEP also took advantage of synergies with other energy efficiency initiatives, which ultimately benefited the citizens of northern California. CEEP is the most-recognized, ratepayer-funded, local-government energy efficiency program in California. BII is a member of the BIRA Building America team and is the research and education arm of the California Building Industry Association. More research highlights.
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