Energy Savings Performance Contracting and New Construction

Abstract

Energy savings performance contracting (ESPC) is a tool that has
been available to the federal government for several years to assist de-
partments and agencies to meet energy reduction targets mandated
through a series of executive orders. ESPCs have been traditionally ap-
plied to existing facilities—an energy services company (ESCO) would
gather data on a government customer’s facilities, analyze that data to
identify retrofits and operational strategies that would result in reduced
utility costs to operate the facilities, and subsequently implement the
identified retrofits/strategies using the savings generated by the im-
provements to pay for the improvements. The ESCO guarantees that the
savings will be available to pay for the improvements, and it demon-
strates that the savings exist through various measurement and verifica-
tion protocols throughout the performance period of the ESPC.
In a new construction scenario, many of the data points available
when undertaking a traditional ESPC are lacking. However, the General
Services Administration, in partnership with the Department of
Energy’s Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP) element and a
couple of ESCOs, has successfully adapted ESPCs to new construction
by using innovative techniques to establish performance baselines and
building system simulation programs. This article will cover the basic
concepts in the application of ESPCs to new construction and use a
couple of case studies—the federal courthouse in Gulfport, Mississippi,
and the Federal Research Center at White Oak in Silver Spring, Mary-
land, to demonstrate the value of this approach to the federal govern-
ment. The ESCO for both case studies was Sempra Energy Solutions
(SES).