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Among the several bills in the US Congress dealing with energy and climate change, the proposed ‘Building Star bill’ offers incentives to realise significant energy savings from commercial buildings and multi-family houses, including rebates for replacement chillers and servicing on space heating equipment and cooling systems.

Introduced earlier this year by Senators Jeff Merkley and Mark Pryor, the ‘Building Star bill’ would provide up to $6 billion in rebates and tax incentives for owners of commercial buildings and multifamily residential buildings to retrofit their buildings with energy efficient building equipment and materials or undertake services to enhance their energy efficiency.

According to Senator Jeff Merkley, a cosponsor of the bill, the initiative if passed will save building owners more than $3 billion on their energy bills annually by reducing enough peak electricity demand to avoid the need for nearly three dozen 300 MW power plants.

Rebates for unitary heat pumps and replacement chillers

The proposed bill prescribes rebates for the purchase and installation of qualifying water heaters, unitary air conditioners and unitary heat pumps among others. Rebates for qualified unitary air conditioners and unitary heat pumps would for example amount between $100 and $200 per ton cooling capacity depending on the efficiency of the equipment.

Rebates would also be available for replacement chillers, service on space heating equipment and cooling systems, as well as HVAC testing, balancing, and duct sealing. The rebates available for qualified replacement chillers would amount to the product obtained by multiplying $150 with the tonnage rating of the replaced chiller, while in the case where all chilled water distribution pumps connected to the qualified replacement chiller include variable frequency drives, the rebate level will amount to the product obtained by multiplying $100 with any chiller tonnage downsizing.

Rebates for Eligible Energy Efficiency Services

The bill proposed the following rebate levels by type of service:

• Energy audits or retro commissioning studies: $0.05 per square foot of audited or commissioned building space; or 50% of the cost of the audit or study.

• Energy efficient building operations and maintenance training: $2,000 per individual trained and certified.

• Service on space heating equipment: $100 per unit serviced.

• Service on cooling systems: $2 per ton of nameplate capacity of the serviced cooling system, or 50% of the total service, whichever is the least amount

• Energy monitoring and management systems: rebate equal to the lesser of $0.45 per square foot of building space covered by the qualified energy monitoring and management system; or 50% of the total installation and commissioning costs for the installation of such systems in a commercial building or multifamily residential building that have analog controls, or if no control system exists. For upgrading existing systems to add submetering to all major individual loads, the rebate would equal to the lesser of $0.15 per square foot of building space covered by the energy management system, or 50% of the total installation cost.

• HVAC testing, balancing, and duct sealing: $0.75 per square foot of duct surface tested, balanced, and if necessary, sealed.

Establishing a ‘Building Star Energy Efficiency Loan Program’

In addition to rebates to reduce the cost of energy-saving measures, ‘Building Star’ will also extend low-interest financing options to small businesses and other building owners, to assist them with the upfront cost of a building renovation by letting them pay off the cost out of the savings on their energy bill.

Current status of the bill

This bill is in the first step in the legislative process. Introduced bills and resolutions first go to committees that deliberate, investigate, and revise them before they go to general debate.