The Challenge
The City of Eugene understands the importance of leadership by example in their community. The triple-bottom-line concept is a very important driver for the City of Eugene. Staff responsible for city energy management work closely with the Eugene Water and Electric Board (EWEB, the local municipal utility) to make these processes as streamlined as possible.
However, Eugene was in need of a deeper dive into their municipal benchmarking strategies. They wanted to know how to use this data to identify inefficient buildings, prioritize upgrades, update operational strategies, and guide policy. They also wanted to know how their approaches compared to other cities of the same size.
The Solution
With help from the Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance (NEEA), the City of Eugene undertook a comprehensive and strategic approach to evaluating energy performance across the city’s municipal facilities. A team worked with city staff to develop priorities for portfolio management and performance upgrades. This process engaged multiple city departments, the electric, gas, and water utilities, policymakers, and other stakeholders in meaningful discussions of broader city energy goals.
Over a series of facilitated meetings, the energy team created a plan to address operational strategies, develop quantitative metrics for energy efficiency improvements, and consolidate approaches into one working document to guide the team to success. The aim of the effort was to streamline the benchmarking process, create a replicable template, and use this information in decision-making for future building upgrades.
The Results
The plan has given Eugene the impetus for a cultural and organizational reinvigoration regarding advancement toward climate goals. Despite Eugene’s long history of energy management, the process had become rather informal. Now, department heads, policymakers and city staff are re-engaged in the work being done by the energy team. This process has reminded various departments of the importance of tracking energy performance and communicating success.
The City of Eugene has committed to reaching carbon neutrality in municipal operations by 2020. However, this near-term goal will likely trigger the purchase of carbon offsets. This team used the Public Buildings Portfolio Management process to help the city find the right balance between building upgrades, which present higher up-front costs but represent a long-term investment in publicly owned assets, and carbon offsets, which cost less up front but offer no direct longterm benefits to the city. This team held discussions to help city staff frame their justification for building upgrades in this context.
By identifying significant energy users, buildings with abnormal energy usage patterns and trends, and diagnostic recommendations from the FirstView diagnostic analysis, the city was able to prioritize next steps on buildings that presented the most significant opportunity for performance improvement.
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