Each year hundreds of people work their way through the Building Operator Certification (BOC) training. Amongst those students, one earned the esteemed title of 2023 BOC Operator of the Year: Malachi Rein, Director of the Building Energy Exchange St. Louis!

The Smart Building Center (SBC) and BOC take nominations every year for former students from across the country who are using their education to its fullest extent, improving energy efficiency as well as the way their work environment operates. Malachi is an incredible example of this and is beyond deserving of this award!

In the Midwest, reducing and decarbonizing energy use in the residential and commercial sectors will be vital for navigating the energy transition, and many of our states and utilities are taking steps in the right direction. However, this progress makes it easy to overlook another, lagging sector in the Midwest: the industrial sector. 

More than 60 attendees at the 2020 Midwest Energy Solutions Conference attended a workshop focused on engaging industrial customers through energy efficiency. MEEA staff tasked them with a bit of role-play, presenting two policy scenarios constructed to reflect an amalgamation of the industrial energy efficiency landscape in the Midwest. The first scenario featured a mandate for energy savings but some form of industrial opt-out or exemption that removed a substantial number of customers from participation, thus reducing the budget for industrial sector EE programs. The second scenario was a voluntary EE state with limited overall portfolios that also has low industrial program funding.

Here at MEEA, we think our Building Operator Certification instructors are everyday rock stars. They are at the frontlines, teaching building operators how to cut costs and energy usage in their facilities. Our amazing pool of facility and energy managers are why BOC has the reach and impact it does in the Midwest.

We sat down with one BOC instructor who has gone above and beyond this year. Doug Lafever has been an instructor since 2014 and continually impresses us. This year alone, he has instructed eight classes in four states: Indiana, Kansas, Michigan and Nebraska.

Energy efficiency improvements can be expensive and burdensome for residential homeowners, renters and building owners. Luckily, there are an increasing number of financial options to help cover the up-front costs of efficiency upgrades. Below, we lay out several financing options to make our homes and workplaces more energy efficient.  

1. On-Bill Financing

On-bill financing is an umbrella term for a financing program where a charge is added to a customer’s energy bill to repay a loan from a utility for energy efficiency upgrades. The utility acts as the lender and incurs the upfront costs of the improvements.

How It Works

On May 4, Iowa Governor Kim Reynolds signed Senate File 2311(SF 2311) into law, which will make significant changes to the way utilities drive customer energy savings programs within the state. Most notably, the bill caps utility investments in energy efficiency and created a broad opt-out provision for all customers.

Industrial energy efficiency is losing ground in the Midwest. Though it’s one of the most cost-effective energy efficiency measures, states are increasingly allowing industrial customers to opt-out of paying into energy efficiency programs or exempting them from doing so altogether. As a result, overall energy savings and the cost-effectiveness of EE programs are on the edge of decline.

October 16-20 is “Careers in Energy Week” for the state of Illinois. Governor Rauner has recognized that a strong and diverse energy workforce is critical to support the large demand for safe, reliable and affordable energy to support Illinois families, communities and businesses. Energy efficiency is a key component to ensure affordability and reliability for years to come.

Dearly Beloved,

We are gathered here today to say our goodbyes to the Clean Power Plan. With us are some of the Clean Power Plan’s relatives – the Clean Air Act and Massachusetts v. EPA. Thank you for being here. We know this is a loss for all of us in the energy efficiency community.

Big Benefits...

At a recent conference in Milwaukee hosted by M-WERC, the opportunities for reducing energy consumption at small- and medium-sized manufacturing facilities were touted repeatedly: Cost savings, productivity increases, improved worker safety and plant conditions, extended equipment lifetimes, corporate marketing benefits – the list goes on.