Implement a Better Buildings Challenge that expands the 2030 District goals beyond Downtown Dallas.
The Dallas 2030 District initiative is designed to achieve high-performance building construction and operation in the downtown area, with goals to reduce energy and water use as well as transportation emissions. The City will expand this ambitious concept beyond downtown Dallas through collaboration with large commercial building operators, such as manufacturers, universities, and hospitals. The City will encourage participants to improve their building energy efficiency by at least 40% by 2030, and share resources on incentives, financing options and technical service providers. The City will also share success stories and feature participant profiles on the City’s website.
As a step toward developing a commercial energy benchmarking and disclosure ordinance (see Action B11), the City will work with participants in the Better Building Challenge to pilot test different aspects of such a program, including how the program would apply to various building sizes and different reporting methods (e.g., directly to the City, through online programs such as ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager). Participation in this pilot test would be voluntary and would help the City to refine its approach to energy benchmarking. During the pilot testing process, the City will convene meetings with stakeholder groups, including building owners/managers and real estate industry trade groups, to discuss the benefits of such a program and collect input on how to it can be successfully implemented citywide. This engagement process will help establish support for such a program in the future.
No pilot test needed..just implement! Other Cities already have a success story.
There is no mention in the Dallas plan of the following for commercial buildings and operations: a) Demand Side Management (See Austin's plan 2015) - educating businesses about this concept saves money and energy; b) encourgage Submetering (see Atlanta's plan) which can help drive energy usage in new and old buildings by improving energy management and transparency; c) devise an Energy Performance Program that would require less efficient buildings to make incremental energy improvements (see Denver's 80x50 plan); or d) establish minimum energy efficiency standards for rental properties (again, see Denver's plan). I am disappointed that as a CECAP stakeholder that AECOM failed to identify such easily found strategies in other cities' plans that are readily available to find and evaluate that could be implemented in the Dallas draft plan. At least from the broad and generalized narratives of the initiatives provided, I can't find any of these concepts that could make a big difference in all buildings' energy usage within Dallas.
A) Might you consider creating a separate action to continue and report on the City of Dallas’ partnership with the Dallas 2030 District, separate from implementing a Dallas Better Buildings Challenge? This might be an immediate action. B) Where might responsibility lie for reporting on the Dallas 2030 District activities to the CECAP team and City Council? C) Please consider updating the Environment and Sustainability Committee on the Dallas 2030 District. D) Are there any Texas Cities participating in the Better Buildings Challenge other than Fort Worth that Dallas can collaborate with? DETAILS: 1) The Dallas 2030 District website shows that it has already expanded beyond its original Central Business District (CBD) scope to include the Design District, Harwood, Uptown, Victory Park, Oaklawn/Turtle Creek, Klyde Warren Park, and the Medical District: https://www.2030districts.org/dallas/about At the Feb. 3, 2020 meeting of the Environment and Sustainability Committee, per the preliminary minutes, Chair Narvaez “praised the Dallas 2030 District and asked about how it can be expanded”: http://cityofdallas.legistar.com/gateway.aspx?M=F&ID=535545f1-91d1-446a-9506-afe3b3cb5cd2.docx Other TX examples are San Antonio (established) and Austin (emerging): https://www.2030districts.org/sanantonio, https://www.2030districts.org/austin 2) Congratulations to the City of Dallas for already being a member of the Dallas 2030 District, both as a Professional Stakeholder and as a Property Owner/Manager: https://www.2030districts.org/dallas/members 3) Fort Worth does not (that I can find) have a 2030 District, but it does have a “Community Partnership with the Better Buildings Challenge”: https://betterbuildingssolutioncenter.energy.gov/partners/fort-worth-tx Technically, the Better Buildings Challenge is only one part of the DOE Better Buildings initiative: https://betterbuildingssolutioncenter.energy.gov/challenge/about https://betterbuildingssolutioncenter.energy.gov/