| U.S. CAPITAL GOES GREEN |
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One small step to conservation in the capital.
According to an article in Trends Magazine written by the Honorable
Mary Cheh, the District of Columbia has enacted the Clean and Affordable Energy Act. The purpose of this act was to create a trust fund that would be used to develop, coordinate and provide programs that promote sustainable energy uses for the District. The trust fund established by the Clean and Affordable Energy Act is administered by a third party known as the Sustainable Energy Utility ("the SEU"). The SEU will be able to use funds generated by current utility surcharges to develop resources that promote energy efficiency. The SEU will be overseen by an advisory board made up of members from government, utility companies, renewable energy industry personnel, members of the low-income communities and others. The SEU is responsible for meeting performance standards under its contract with the District. These standards include the responsibilities of reducing per-capita consumption of energy, slowing peak demand growth, limiting energy consumption by large users and improving low-income housing energy efficiency. The way the contract is structured, if SEU meets these responsibilities, its profits will increase. If it doesn't meet the standards, it will be found in violation of its contract. The legislation also includes a provision that requires public disclosure of building energy profiles. Many of the District's homes and buildings have windows, doors and insulation that are very old. These buildings are not energy efficient and are difficult to retrofit. It is hoped that by mandating disclosure of how energy efficient a particular building is that owners will have the incentive to improve the efficiency as a marketing tool. The monitoring would also offer an incentive to be responsible for individual energy use. The members of the District feel that the passage of this bill is a first step to meeting energy demands of the future. By making people more aware of their usage and encouraging efficiency, the District is addressing both the problems of rising energy costs and declining energy supply. The sponsor of the bill hopes that this bill can serve as a model for other areas. A blogg by Terry Drake |
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