New York State offers $36 million for energy efficiency on commercial buildings

The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) has made $36 million available through two new initiatives aimed at increasing energy efficiency of commercial buildings.

The programs are available to many properties including office towers, universities, hospitals, and retail stores — which are some of the state’s biggest energy users. The two programs are estimated to cut energy bills of participating buildings by more than $200 million over eight years.

About $30 million is available through NYSERDA for Real Time Energy Management to support the use of advanced technologies to help building owners fine-tune their building’s energy systems, identify capital projects to cut energy costs, and reduce operations and management costs by an expected 5% to 25%.

NYSERDA plans to make $6 million available to building owners and their tenants to improve energy efficiency in leased office spaces. These areas typically consume 40% to 60% of a building’s total energy use. 

Companies that design and build energy efficient office spaces for their employees can anticipate paying an average of 30% less for energy than they would pay in a typical office space.