In order to assist the State and Territory Energy Offices as they implement programs under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) and the Inflation Reduction Act (2022), NASEO has developed this library of sample program documents (including RFPs) that may be adapted for use in the design and implementation of new programs. Currently, this library highlights buildings and transportation-focused program resources, including those from voluntary and mandatory building energy improvement programs, shared energy manager programs, and those compiled in the EV States Clearinghouse. 

This page will be updated and may change significantly as IIJA and IRA are implemented. This model program and policy library is a supplementary resource to NASEO’s IIJA Resource Hub. If your state has sample programs, policies, or documents that should be included in this resource list, please contact Jasmine Xie (jxie@naseo.org).  

NASEO is available to review state plan drafts and offer technical assistance to state and local jurisdictions on accessing program funding. For more information on state energy planning, please contact Sam Cramer (scramer@naseo.org).

  • Relevant Funding Opportunities

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    NASEO tracks key funding opportunities from the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA) of 2021, the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) of 2022, and grant offerings by federal agencies that may be leveraged by building owners, state agencies, and local entities to advance efforts to efficiently electrify and improve the energy efficiency of new and existing buildings. NASEO has compiled several resources that are regularly updated that capture the latest updates and deadlines for relevant funding opportunities across all energy sectors (including buildings), along with eligible uses, eligible entities, individual award amounts, and more.

     

  • Building Energy Codes

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    • NASEO's Sample RFP for Southwest Energy Codes Field Study
      NASEO published this RFP for a qualified organization to perform two state-wide residential energy code field studies in Colorado and Nevada as part of a grant award from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Building Technologies Office. This RFP defines the scope of work for the field study, which focused on newly constructed single-family homes and required field observations on key specifications, including envelope tightness, fenestration, wall insulation, ceiling insulation, lighting, foundation insulation, and duct tightness. The RFP also details contractor qualifications, with evaluative criteria on experience conducting past field studies, ability to obtain high quality and accurate data, and ability to meet requirements in the scope of work in a timely manner.
  • Voluntary Benchmarking and Energy Improvement Programs

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    • Clean Energy Communities
      The Clean Energy Communities (CEC) program is administered by the New York State Energy Research & Development Authority (NYSERDA) and incentivizes municipalities in New York to implement clean energy and energy efficiency projects from a pre- approved list of “high-impact actions”, based on which they can pursue grant funding and recognition opportunities.
    • Massachusetts Green Communities
      The Green Communities Designation and Grant Program was created by the Massachusetts Department of Energy Resources (DOER) and designates a municipality a "Green Community" after they meet five criteria, upon which they can access grants to implement clean energy projects in public buildings and facilities. All municipalities, regardless of Green Community recognition status, can access technical support from DOER on conducting energy efficiency improvements.
      • Massachusetts DOER Municipal Energy Technical Assistance Grant Program 
        • In 2020, the DOER Green Communities Division made $250,000 available for municipalities to contract independent third parties for assistance with developing and managing energy projects. 
      • DOER: Green Communities Technical Assistance for Massachusetts Municipalities Request for Response  
        • A request for response published by the DOER during the first program year of Green Communities that solicits a qualified vendor to help municipalities meet Green Community criteria by performing initial site visits and developing action plans.
      • Regional Energy Planning Assistance Grant Program
        • In subsequent years of the Green Communities Program, DOER has offered Energy Planning Assistance (REPA) Grants to eligible Technical Assistance Agencies including Regional Planning Agencies to augment municipal capacity necessary to: 1) participate in the Green Communities Designation and Grant Program; and 2) advance clean energy projects in under-resourced municipalities. Linked is a bid solicitation for the 2021 REPA program year.
    • Illinois Energy Now Trade Ally Program
      The Illinois Energy Now Trade Ally Program, which ran between 2012 and 2015, developed a network of industry experts and private energy service providers to train on statewide incentives and energy efficiency technology. The program then facilitated relationships between the public sector and private energy service providers and fostered competition through a recognition program for service providers that performed the most public sector energy efficiency upgrade projects. This program was created through a State Energy Program Competitive award in 2012 ($427,500).
    • Focus on Energy and Wisconsin Utility's RFP for Multifamily Energy Efficiency Program Implementer
      Focus on Energy, an agency that offers resources, financial incentives, and implements energy projects on behalf of utilities across Wisconsin, released this request for proposal (RFP) for an experienced implementer for their Multifamily Energy Efficiency Program. The RFP seeks program designs that support the needs of multifamily building owners, property managers, and tenants; that target the affordable housing market; and that address the multifamily sector's unique "split incentive" of energy efficiency benefits between building owners and tenants.
    • Michigan Battle of Buildings
      In its eighth year, the Michigan Battle of the Buildings is an annual program that recognizes commercial (including multifamily homes) and industrial buildings for reducing energy consumption and implementing energy efficient practices. Building owners benchmark their building energy use with ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager and by participating in the program, join a network of building owners and operators, energy service and product providers, and financing institutions to exchange ideas.
    • Texas State Energy Conservation Office (SECO) City Efficiency Leaders Project and White Papers on Best Practices

      Benchmarking City Properties: City of Houston Case Study

      This case study summarizes the City of Houston’s efforts around benchmarking 10 million square feet of its city-owned building space, across approximately 400 properties, using ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager. The City uses the benchmarking data to prioritize buildings for energy retrofits; track progress of retrofit projects; inform the design of behavioral energy use programs; and participate in the Department of Energy’s (DOE) Better Building Challenge, an annual recognition program for high performance buildings. The City has a dedicated benchmarking team that gathers data from a variety of supporting offices, particularly the General Services Department, Human Resources and Administration and Regulatory Affairs, which provides data on monthly utility bills and usage, building operating hours, square footage, ownership, and occupancy, among other required inputs for benchmarking in Portfolio Manager.

      Revolving Funds for City Efficiency Projects: City of San Antonio Case Study

      This case study summarizes Revolving Funds for City Efficiency Projects in San Antonio, Texas, which has helped the City reduce its annual $34 million utility budget through facilities retrofits. The Revolving Fund was established using $4.6 million from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) in 2011 and has since been used for 398 total municipal retrofits. This has resulted in improved energy performance across the City’s building portfolio and has increased the number of buildings eligible for ENERGY STAR Certification. The program leverages ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager to establish building performance baselines for a comprehensive measurement and verification process of savings attributable to the retrofit. Portfolio Manager savings reports and in-house tracking spreadsheets are also used for tracking energy savings and avoided costs in completed projects.

      El Paso’s Energy Savings Challenge

      This case study summarizes El Paso’s Behavioral Energy Savings Challenge, an effort by the El Paso Office of Sustainability to reduce municipal energy consumption through cultural shifts within city building maintenance and operations. This program was deployed in library and fire department buildings and required benchmarking to develop energy performance baselines for participating buildings. There were initially significant delays to accessing whole-building monthly utility data benchmarking due to a process of requesting each month’s data, which was eventually resolved when the Facilities and Fleet Management department created a shared drive for regularly uploading utility bills and the Office of Sustainability could capture the data and run analytics through Excel spreadsheets. This process could be streamlined by using ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager in future years, which offers combined capabilities of energy use data analytics and automated utility data sharing.

      Optimizing Energy and Water Management in Local Governments

      This case study looks across six of Texas’ major cities: Austin, Dallas, El Paso, Fort Worth, Houston, and San Antonio, at the departments and governmental entities responsible for energy and water efficiency. This statewide report finds that in most cities, more than one governmental entity is in charge of building energy and water efficiency, indicating the need to break down siloes between departments. The report also points out that several cities use ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager as their main way of sharing data across departments and managing energy data. However, Portfolio Manager is also used in a myriad of energy management approaches that also involve configurations of Excel spreadsheets and third party software platforms. This implicates the need to assert statewide best practices and coordinate the approach on energy data management between cities.

      Keeping PACE in Texas: PACE in a Box

      This toolkit was developed for Texas counties and municipalities to create Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) Loan Programs that enable commercial and industrial property owners to obtain low-cost, long-term loans for energy and water efficiency facility improvements. This toolkit promotes the use of ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager in the program application process, where PACE project property owners would use Portfolio Manager to collect energy and water use (across all fuel types) for the first year of a PACE project. The use of Portfolio Manager as an empirical data collection tool also helps with the annual reporting and review process, where projected savings estimates reported to the PACE program administrator should be verified by actual energy and water savings. The PACE program administrator could also make the annually reported data available to the local government accompanied by recommendations for regional and/or statewide policy or program improvements.

       

       

  • Benchmarking Ordinances and Building Performance Standards

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    Existing Toolkits and Resource Libraries

    To access technical assistance on implementing building performance standards or benchmarking policies, please contact Caterina Hatcher and Brendan Hall from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) at (statelocal@energystar.gov).

    Training and Task Force Development

    Determining Final and/or Interim Performance Standards

    Program Assessment

  • Shared Energy Manager Programs

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    K-12 Public Schools

    • Kentucky School Energy Managers Project Case Study
      This case study summarizes the Kentucky School Energy Managers Project (SEMP), which used funding from the State Energy Program and partnerships with local investor-owned utilities to deploy 49 energy managers to implement energy management plans and identify energy savings opportunities across most school districts in Kentucky.
    • Rhode Island Municipal Energy Management Services Provider Solicitation
      This is an RFP document issued by the Rhode Island Office of Energy Resources (the State Energy Office) soliciting professional energy management services to support municipalities and school districts throughout Rhode Island. For more information, please contact Nathan Cleveland, Programming Services Officer at the Rhode Island Office of Energy Offices (nathan.cleveland@energy.ri.gov).
    • School Uplift - Energy Efficiency Grants - TVA EnergyRight
      Tennessee Valley Authority, a federally owned electric utility, offers the School Uplift program that provides grant funding towards energy upgrades in under-resourced schools and offers energy management training to faculty, staff, and students on energy efficiency and conservation practices. The State of Tennessee has been a key partner in School Uplift, providing matching grants through the Energy Efficient Schools Initiative fund since the program's pilot.

    All Public Buildings

    • West Virginia Benchmarking and Transparency Initiative
      In 2018, the West Virginia Office of Energy, funded by a USDOE Competitive SEP Award, began a statewide Benchmarking and Transparency Initiative, using ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager, and develop a comprehensive building inventory that led to the unanimous passing of HB 2667: Energy Savings in Public Buildings. This bill sets the state's first energy reduction goal of 25 percent by 2030, establishes a state benchmarking and disclosure policy and calls for a comprehensive performance contracting program. This initiative engages a cohort of agency stakeholders to benchmark state and municipal buildings, as well as university and high school staff and students to benchmark all K-12 school and higher education buildings.
    • Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Local Climate Action Plan and Shared Energy Manager Program
      The Pennsylvania DEP offers the Local Climate Action Program (LCAP), an SEP-funded initiative that connects and trains local governments with students from Penn State University to collaboratively develop greenhouse gas emissions inventories and identify climate-related vulnerabilities on behalf of the local government. This collaborative effort offers a unique professional development opportunity for the students and results in the publication of a climate action plan for the municipality, which also then qualifies the locality to access free assistance from shared energy managers (third party engineering and energy professionals contracted by the state) to begin implementing energy efficiency improvement measures.
  • Sustainable Transportation

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    EV Infrastructure Programs

    • EV States Clearinghouse
      The EV States Clearinghouse is a one-stop shop for state agencies as they plan for and implement EV infrastructure programs under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and includes example EV infrastructure RFIs and RFPs from the states. The Clearinghouse is a password-protected site for states only; state agencies may register for a free account.