MEDIA ADVISORY
March 31, 2016
ATTENTION: Reporters covering the environment, energy, climate change, real estate and housing.
WHAT: A new report, Powering the Savings, reveals that efficiency efforts are not keeping pace with growing electricity demand in California. The report calls for a new ‘pay-for-performance’ approach to unlock capital market investment, simplify the retrofit process and make it a more attractive option for building owners.
WHEN: Report release on March 31, 2016
FREE WEBINAR on report findings April 18, from 10 am – 11 am. Register here
Who: Lead author Ethan Elkind, director of the Climate Change and Business Program at the UC Berkeley and UCLA Schools of Law. Webinar participants include:
Jeanne Clinton, special advisor to Governor Brown for Energy Efficiency, California PUC
Cynthia Mitchell, energy economist and TURN consultant
Dennis Quinn, CEO and co-founder, Joule Assets
Details: Pay-for-performance programs set an energy-savings baseline for a building, and then provide payments for savings achieved beyond that target. This encourages building owners to deploy more substantial efficiency measures than they otherwise may have under traditional rebate or fixed incentive programs.
Reducing the energy demand from buildings can help California meet its greenhouse gas reduction goals, as electricity use in existing buildings accounts for 21 percent of the state’s emissions. Without reductions in this sector, the state will struggle to meet benchmarks set by the California Global Warming Solutions Act: rolling back emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, with an additional 40 percent reduction planned by 2030, and another 80 percent reduction by 2050.
California has relied on voluntary, largely self-financed efficiency measures, which have failed to achieve deep energy-use reductions, according to the report.
The report is a joint publication of the UC Berkeley Law Center for Law, Energy & the Environment and the UCLA Law Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
For more info about Powering the Savings, the webinar and interviews, contact Ethan Elkind, eelkind@law.berkeley.edu, (m) 310-729-0902