by Shane Henson — May 24, 2013—Federal agencies across the United States have been successful in finding ways to conserve energy and water, effectively reducing their environmental footprint and saving taxpayer dollars, according to the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Federal Energy Management Program (FEMP).
FEMP, a program tasked with enabling federal agencies to meet energy-related goals and to provide energy leadership to the country, released reports and data this month that illustrate the progress made by federal agencies in meeting the requirements of Section 432 of the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (EISA).
According to the DOE, EISA requires federal agencies to identify “covered facilities” that constitute at least 75 percent of their total facility energy use and designate an energy manager responsible for implementing the requirements at each covered facility. The energy management practices required by Section 432 of EISA (42 U.S.C. 8253(f)) include:
- Performing comprehensive energy and water evaluations at each covered facility every four years to identify potential energy and water efficiency and conservation measures;
- Implementing efficiency projects at covered facilities and reporting costs and estimated savings;
- Following up on implemented projects and reporting measured savings; and
- Annually benchmarking metered buildings that are, or are a part of, covered facilities and reporting performance.
Key findings from the data reported include:
- Agencies have designated 6,927 covered facilities subject to the EISA requirements, comprising 2.7 billion square feet of building space and using 89 percent of the energy consumed at federal facilities.
- Comprehensive evaluations have been completed on 5,032 of the 6,927 covered facilities, identifying approximately $9.6 billion in potential investments in efficiency measures.
- Agencies have reported 1,275 efficiency projects implemented in covered facilities, saving approximately 6.9 trillion Btu of energy and 4.4 billion gallons of water each year.
- Agencies have also reported annual benchmarking metrics for 1,613 metered buildings, which help them track performance over time and against similar buildings.
