The funds will come from the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant the city received from the Department of Energy last year as part of the broad federal stimulus package.

To qualify, among other things, you must contract with a Certified Energy Manager (Green Squared has these) to perform an energy audit (Green Squared does these) and make energy utilization recommendations for the office building and the minimum amount of work to qualify for this program is $100,000.

This announcement coincides with the comments that we relayed in August from Spanjian at the Clean Air Through Energy Efficiency Conference held in Austin.

It also jives with what Spanjian said in reference to slowing PACE progress in Texas.

Houston, the “Oil Capital of the World”, has a recently appointed Director of Sustainability, Laura Spanjian, and she told the Texas Tribune that her city was “not going to wait” for the PACE problems to get solved. “We have set aside funds to help commercial property owners with the upfront costs of energy efficiency improvements,” she said in an e-mail. “We’re going to find another model in the short-term while the issues with PACE are being worked out.”

Kudos to Ms. Spanjian on her aggressive approach.

Hat tip to Green Tech Media and Venture Beat’s Green Beat that do great jobs on the money that flows into the space.

Cleantech saw $7.8 Billion in 2010 (the most post-credit bubble), but that was somewhat tempered with slower third and fourth quarters.

“Venture funds are still in a cautious place” as they continue to try to raise money for their own funds, said Sheerez Haji, CEO of Cleantech Group. That makes it hard for early-stage startups, as investors look for later-stage companies where “the technology risk has been taken care of,” he said.

Greentech mentions that December was a big month, however. There were more than 40 solar, smart grid, efficiency, lighting, biofuels, wind and recycling firms that raised more than $700M in VC in December.

A couple of interesting other highlights:

++ OPower, the home energy-efficiency startup, closed on their round C with $50 million led by two of Silicon Valley’s premier VC firms — Kleiner Perkins and Accel Partners, along with New Enterprise Associates. OPower is focused on customer engagement and behavior modification, and is currently providing tens of thousands of homes with in-home energy data and efficiency advice via paper reports or online. The platform is described as advanced customer engagement.

They got a visit from Obama earlier this year with respect to clean jobs.

More on OPower’s $50M raise here.

See our earlier discussion using energy data to curb usage behavior: New Electric Bill could Drive Better Usage

++ Energy efficiency continues to be the hottest segment with 7 deals for $162 million in the fourth quarter per E&Y.

++ Solar saw $150 million in 10 deals.

Ernst & Young itself seems bullish on cleantech’s future. “This quarter reflects the ongoing volatility in cleantech investment that we have observed over the past two years, depending on the presence of the very large transactions we see in cleantech,” said Jay Spencer, Ernst & Young’s Americas cleantech director, in a company statement. “However, a number [of] factors point to the continuing strength in the U.S. cleantech sector, including growth in energy efficiency investments and corporate involvement throughout multiple industries — from utilities to technology to consumer products.”

Don’t forget that you can follow us on Twitter @greensquaredcom.

Vice President Biden said, “The initiatives announced today are putting the Recovery Through Retrofit report’s recommendations into action – giving American families the tools they need to invest in home energy upgrades. Together, these programs will grow the home retrofit industry and help middle class families save money and energy.”

Now we need a working solution for building owners, whether it is PACE or something else.

Per the report, the following EEMs played important roles in reaching the 50% energy savings target:

• The baseline hydronic VAV system was replaced with radiant heated and cooled slab
ceilings with DOAS for ventilation.

• Total plug loads were reduced by 23% to 0.68 W/ft2 (7.3 W/m2) by purchasing high efficiency electronic equipment and employing control strategies to eliminate plug loads when equipment was not being used.

I like how they approached all of the major energy drivers: building envelope, HVAC, lights, AND PLUGLOAD. Plugloads are often ignored and are hidden consumers in buildings.

I may have missed the full payback calculations (it is, after all, 163 pages), but I sure what have liked to see them. They did provide a summary of paybacks which were somewhat disappointing:

Low-energy high-rise large office buildings featuring well integrated energy efficiency measures demonstrated simple payback periods of less than ten years; low-energy low-rise large office buildings had simple payback periods of between nine and 16 years; and low-energy high-rise large office buildings with high glazing
fraction and minimal insulation had simple payback periods of greater than 20 years.

What about in this economy?

Prior to the recession, LEED-certified buildings enjoyed noticeably faster lease-up times and lower vacancy rates in addition to commanding higher rental premiums compared with their non-green peers.

However, currently, vacancy rates have remained relatively high for Class A LEED-certified buildings, with a national average of 37.6% compared with 25.8% for all Class A office.

Why?

Many of the new Class A office buildings that started development before the recession and came online after the economy had begun to weaken were LEED certified buildings. As a result of the economy, many new office buildings have struggled to attract tenants and have higher than average vacancy rates.

Miller then analyzed two sets of office buildings: pre-recession new builds (completed 2000-2005) and post 2005 new builds.

Pre-recession completed Class A LEED office buildings average $28.50 per square foot in rent with an average vacancy rate of 6.5%, compared with $25.89 per square foot in average rent and an average vacancy of 10.7% for all Class A office stock. That’s a 10% rent premium!

In post 2005 completed buldings, the LEED certified buildings average $33.24 per square foot compared to $30.11 per square foot for all Class A office. Again, that’s over 10% rent premium!

However, the national vacancy rate for all Class A LEED office properties was 36.4% at the end of the first quarter of 2010, compared with 31.1% for all Class A multi-tenant office property. That makes it about a push in this economy, but as the economy strengthens that rental premium will pay big long-term dividends. Plus, annual operating expenses should be less in the LEED building, tilting the balance again to green.

Don’t forget that Green Squared promotes Green that makes cents! — (i) “green”, as in environmental sustainability, and (ii) “green”, as in cost savings. That’s Green²; that’s Green Squared!

The city of Houston announced a new initiative called the Green Office Challenge with the goal of getting property owners and managers across the city to reduce their energy consumption, water use and waste, as well as encourage more office tenants to do things like recycle, car pool and use eco-friendly products.

A key component of the initiative includes an energy-efficient loan program that would provide an incentive to those concerned about the costs of going green. Later this fall, the city plans to offer low-cost loans to property owners and tenants, providing the money goes to reducing their energy usage. This will be part of Houston’s answer to some of the issues surrounding PACE financing. (See earlier blog article titled, “Four Texas cities eye PACE program”)

“People like the idea of doing energy-efficiency improvements, but they still get nervous about that upfront capital,” said Laura Spanjian, the mayor’s director of sustainability.

The details of the program are not yet finalized but it sounds as though the city will have about $7 million to make energy-efficiency loans at less than 3%.

Other Houston Greening Facts:
No. 8 in the nation in the number of LEED-certified buildings with 89
No. 6 in the nation in the number of Energy Star-rated buildings with 133

For more Houston green facts, see our notes from the recent Clean Air Through Energy Efficiency where Spanjian spoke.

Here are some of the highlights:

+ The City of Houston itself uses almost 500 million kilowatt hours of green power annually, which accounts for a third of all its consumption.

+ Green is not just for a small group of companies these days. Many companies now have Chief Sustainability Officers. The list of companies that use 100 percent renewable energy is enormous and includes companies that are vital to the Houston and Texas business community like Kohl’s, Whole Foods, and Dell Computers, to name a few.

+ It is easy to be greener by installing aerators, low-flow showerheads, T-5 or T-8 lights, variable frequency drives, and automation systems that have very short paybacks.

As we mentioned last week here, there are already 1.7 million smart meters deployed in Texas, and 6 million will be deployed by 2013. This article from the Financial Post notes that about 76 million smart meters have been installed around the world and that number is expected to more than double by 2013.

What are Smart Meters?

Smart meters pinpoint and record how much and when electricity is used — typically on an hourly basis — and automatically transmit that information to the utility via a two-way communications network. Whereas, conventional electricity meters measure the only total amount of electricity used over a specified billing period.

Picture: Wikipedia

Here’s a quick run-down of several energy-efficient projects cited in the article.

Projects at Fairmont Waterfront hotel include a heat-recovery system to preheat incoming city water using heat captured from the hotel’s water system. It saves an estimated 305,380 kilowatt-hours (1,100 GJ) per year and $12,000 per year. Estimated payback is in two years.

In a separate article, Fairmont set a corporate commitment to reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions by 20 percent from its 2006 levels by 2013.

The conference was opened by Austin Mayor Lee Leffingwell, C. Donald Babers, Regional Administrator for Region VI, U.S. HUD and Texas Public Utility Commission Chairman Barry Smitherman.

Smitherman provided some interesting Texas/ERCOT stats:

+ 1.7 million smart meters are installed as of July 31
+ 6 million will be installed by 2013
+ 9300 megawatts from wind in ERCOT footprint (900 MW more in Texas but out of ERCOT footprint)
+ 18,500 megawatts from wind in ERCOT planned by 2013 (that would be 20-25% of load)
+ There is a proposed rule for NON-WIND renewable target of 500 MW (most likely, solar)

From Dub Taylor of the State Energy Conservation Office, he provided this data of the fuel mix in Electricity in Texas for 2009:
+ Natural Gas 51%
+ Coal 34%
+ Nuclear 10%
+ Renewables (basically wind) 4%

One of the highlights of the conference, of which there were many, was the presentation by the new City of Houston Sustainablity Director, Laura Spanjian (we touched on Spanjian earlier this month on this blog here), summarizing the Houston’s achievements in sustainable growth. In March of this year the City of Houston was recognized for being ranked sixth on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s 2009 list of cities with the most energy efficient buildings.

Ms. Spanjian woke the crowd up after lunch with an inspired delivery of City of Houston accomplishments.

Solar and Wind initiatives include: A 100KW solar system at George R. Brown Convention Center funded jointly by the Houston Endowment ($850k), BP ($100k) and CenterPoint ($50k) and the purchase of 2 billion kwh (50 MW of power) from Texas Wind Farms over the next 5 years. The EPA ranks the City of Houston as the #1 in terms of renewable energy purchased by a municipality.

Other energy efficiency initiatives include the LED traffic lights at 2,000 intersections which have a cost savings of $3.6M per year, the LED Streetlight Pilot Project which are up to 50% more energy efficient and 755 hybrid vehicles (the 3rd largest municipal fleet in the country). It should also be noted METRO is purchasing is purchasing 100 hybrid buses a year and will have 449 in total by 2011.

Houston is “LEED”ing the way for all new construction, as mandated in 2004, and the Looscan Library was the City’s first LEED Certified building with a LEED Gold on Central Permitting Center and Fire Station 90 not far behind. Add to all of this the Residential Program for kWh reductions, the Weatherization Program, improving air quality using MAAM and DIAL technologies and Houston is well on its way to leading the nation in energy strategies.

We applaud the new Mayor Parker and her selection of Laura Spanjian as Sustainability Director.

It was a great presentation!

By the way, the event was held at the AT&T Executive Education and Conference Center on UT’s campus. The facility is LEED Gold.