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DOE Awards $452M in Recovery Act Funds for Building Retrofits
Vice President Joe Biden announced on April 21 the selection of 25 states, communities, and organizations to receive $452 million in DOE Recovery Act funding to "ramp-up" energy efficiency building retrofits.
DOE's Retrofit Ramp-Up initiative allows communities, state and local governments, private-sector companies, and non-profit organizations to work together on pioneering programs for concentrated and broad-based neighborhood retrofits. The partnerships will support large-scale retrofits and make energy efficiency accessible to hundreds of thousands of homeowners and businesses.
For example, Lowell, Massachusetts is creating a model for efficiency upgrades in historical buildings. Phoenix, Arizona is retrofitting a least half of all commercial and residential space along a 10-mile stretch adjacent to its new light-rail line. The models created through this program are expected to save households and businesses about $100 million annually.
In addition to the Recovery Act investment, the 25 projects will leverage an estimated $2.8 billion from other sources over the next three years to retrofit hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses across the country. In implementing these projects, grantees will deliver verified energy savings and incorporate sustainable business models to ensure that buildings will continue to be retrofitted after Recovery Act funds are spent.
DOE will use the lessons learned from these pilot programs to develop best-practice guides for comprehensive retrofit programs that can be adopted and implemented by communities across the country. The Retrofit Ramp-Up projects are the competitive portion of DOE's Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant Program and are part of the overall $80 billion Recovery Act investment in clean energy and energy efficiency.
See the DOE press release and the full list of projects (PDF 129 KB).
EPA: U.S. GHG Emissions Down 2.9% in 2008
On April 15, the US EPA released the U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) inventory report for 2008, which shows a 2.9% drop in emissions from 2007.
The agency attributes the drop to a decrease in CO2 emissions due to lower consumption of fossil fuels and electricity. In 2008, the US produced 6,957 million metric tons of CO2; 13.5% higher than 1990 levels.
CO2 contributes 85.1% of the total, with methane in second place at 8.2%, nitrous oxide at 4.6%, and other GHGs contributing the final 2.2%. See the EPA press release and the full report.
The EPA also released a report on environmental indicators of climate change. It looks at 24 key indicators of climate change, including GHG emissions and concentrations in the atmosphere; weather and climate events; and observed impacts on the oceans, global snow and ice cover and on societies and ecosystems. See the EPA press release, the climate change indicators report, and new fact sheets, which are part of the EPA's "Climate Toolbox."
