Tag Archives: Energy

Performance Contracting Helps Save on Energy Costs

Performance Contracting Helps Save on Energy Costs

To improve energy efficiency, some companies are doing more than just turning out the lights at the end of the day.

As soaring energy costs increasingly affect the bottom line of U.S. businesses, the “energy performance contract” has become an attractive solution for commercial building owners. This contract is a financing or operating lease offered by an energy service company, also known as an ESCO, to help businesses improve the energy efficiency of their buildings or facilities.

The key to energy performance contracting is to use long-term utility savings to fund the improvements. The ESCO often guarantees energy savings that will meet or exceed annual payments to cover all project costs, usually over a contract term of seven to 20 years.

“A building owner either pays a utility for an inefficient building, or they can pay an ESCO to improve their building,” says Jeff Stokes, a vice president at World Energy Solutions, a publicly traded ESCO (symbol: WEGY) based in St. Petersburg, Fla.

World Energy Solutions strives to reduce kilowatt usage by up to 30 percent. The company offers a variety of services, including utility billing and rate analysis, energy auditing, installation of building improvements, building systems maintenance and ongoing monitoring and verification of the energy savings.

ESCOs can provide flexible and unique ways to finance their services. For example, World Energy Solutions offers to pay the

total up-front cost of installation as well as equipment maintenance in return for an 80 percent share of the actual savings realized over a minimum 10-year period.

“In some cases, our company will fund the entire installation, at no charge to our customer, and live off the savings we generate over a certain amount of time,” says Ben Croxton, chief executive officer of World Energy Solutions.

ESCOs not only identify energy-saving opportunities, but also develop engineering designs and specifications and manage the entire process. They also can provide staff training and ongoing maintenance services.

Even the federal government has gotten into the act, and for good reason: Executive orders that require federal agencies to use 35 percent less energy by 2010 in comparison to 1985 levels will require billion in energy projects. Much of that will go to “Super Energy Savings Performance Contracts,” offered by the Department of Energy.

Contracting Helps Save on Energy Costs

Contracting Helps Save on Energy Costs

To improve energy efficiency, some companies are doing more than just turning out the lights at the end of the day.

As soaring energy costs increasingly affect the bottom line of U.S. businesses, the “energy performance contract” has become an attractive solution for commercial building owners. This contract is a financing or operating lease offered by an energy service company, also known as an ESCO, to help businesses improve the energy efficiency of their buildings or facilities.

The key to energy performance contracting is to use long-term utility savings to fund the improvements. The ESCO often guarantees energy savings that will meet or exceed annual payments to cover all project costs, usually over a contract term of seven to 20 years.

“A building owner either pays a utility for an inefficient building, or they can pay an ESCO to improve their building,” says Jeff Stokes, a vice president at World Energy Solutions, a publicly traded ESCO (symbol: WEGY) based in St. Petersburg, Fla.

World Energy Solutions strives to reduce kilowatt usage by up to 30 percent. The company offers a variety of services, including utility billing and rate analysis, energy auditing, installation of building improvements, building systems maintenance and ongoing monitoring and verification of the energy savings.

ESCOs can provide flexible and unique ways to finance their services. For example, World Energy Solutions offers to pay the

total up-front cost of installation as well as equipment maintenance in return for an 80 percent share of the actual savings realized over a minimum 10-year period.

“In some cases, our company will fund the entire installation, at no charge to our customer, and live off the savings we generate over a certain amount of time,” says Ben Croxton, chief executive officer of World Energy Solutions.

ESCOs not only identify energy-saving opportunities, but also develop engineering designs and specifications and manage the entire process. They also can provide staff training and ongoing maintenance services.

Even the federal government has gotten into the act, and for good reason: Executive orders that require federal agencies to use 35 percent less energy by 2010 in comparison to 1985 levels will require billion in energy projects. Much of that will go to “Super Energy Savings Performance Contracts,” offered by the Department of Energy.

Who Recognized Residence Landscaping For Energy Preservation Had This Impact?

That Recognized Residence Landscaping For Energy Conservation Had This Result?

If you have been thinking of just how you would love to cut your house energy expenses, you may intend to take a review at your house landscaping. This is an area you might not have actually even thought about. Did you understand energy-efficient home landscaping can decrease your house’s energy consumption for heating & cooling by as much as 25 percent.! That’s shocking, isn’t it? Proper positioning of trees, shrubs, creeping plants, turfs, and hedges lets you modify the microclimate around your residence to make the most of shade during the summer season and also minimize wind chill throughout the winter months. Energy-efficient residence landscaping is just one of the finest investments you can make, since in addition to its possible to increase the resale value of your residential property, it can produce sufficient savings to return your preliminary financial investment in less than eight years. It is not unexpected then that even more house owners than ever before are implementing energy-conserving residence landscaping concepts on their home. So where can we begin with this interesting brand-new landscaping experience? I hope the adhering to info will be helpful to you.

Develop a Residence Landscaping Prepare For Energy Effectiveness
There are numerous home landscaping approaches for power preservation, however not all of them might be ideal for your property and climate area. Before you plant those evergreens in your backyard, make an analysis of the comfort and power imperfections of your current home landscaping. Things like the residential property’s microclimate, home area, as well as the presence of surrounding frameworks will affect your energy-efficient residence landscaping plan. Microclimate is the climate quickly surrounding your residence, as well as in addition to the regional climate, it helps identify which plants and trees will certainly prosper and provide the very best energy-saving benefit to your residence landscaping. Your home’s area impacts your dwelling’s exposure to the sunlight, wind, and also water, as a result forming your home landscaping needs. Neighboring buildings, walls, trees, and bodies of water can generate significant climatic effects that would affect your house landscaping techniques. A thorough evaluation of your property’s features enables you to design an energy-efficient house landscaping scheme that resolves your requirements and goals.

Landscape to Make The Most Of Color
Effectively planned residence landscaping can minimize your air-conditioning expenses in the summertime by providing shade from the hot morning as well as afternoon sun. Deciduous trees (trees that dropped their fallen leaves in winter) supply color in the summer season when its fallen leaves remain in complete flower and warm the home in wintertime by letting low-angle winter months sunlight filter via its bare branches. Home landscaping that maximizes shade can reduce temperature level inside the house by as much as 8 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit. Would you consider shielding your air-conditioner via home landscaping since that boosts the system’s effectiveness. Additionally, shading the ground and pavement with trees, shrubs, and groundcover plants reduces surrounding air temperatures. Various other heat-reducing house landscaping ideas include developing a trellis for climbing creeping plants to shade a patio area and planting a row of bushes to shade a driveway.

Landscaspe for Wind Defense
Home landscaping to draw away the circulation of cool winds assists lower your home heating expenses in the winter months. Trees, hedges, bushes, wall surfaces, as well as fences make reliable windbreaks for winter-protected residence landscaping. You can accomplish sufficient wind protection via house landscaping by growing evergreen trees and also shrubs along the north as well as northwest locations of your residential or commercial property. Windbreaks can decrease wind rate for a distance as long as 30 times its elevation, although maximum wind protection occurs at a distance of 2 to five times the fully grown elevation of windbreaks. For optimum wind protection, make certain that the foliage density on the windward side of your residential or commercial property is 60 percent. A well-designed house landscaping gives power cost savings year-round. Take pleasure in the warmth of the wintertime sun by not planting evergreens also close to the south side of your residence. Bushes, shrubs and also vines planted near to your house develop quiet areas that protect your home in both winter season and also summertime.

I hope this write-up has actually been helpful to you in developing landscaping for power preservation. Decreasing my home energy usage by a feasible 25% has actually inspired me to begin taking a look around my lawn.

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