Department of Energy program director visits AFCEC

  • Published
  • By Jennifer McCabe
  • AFCEC Public Affairs
TYNDALL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. --  The director of the Federal Energy Management Program at the Department of Energy, Dr. Tim Unruh, met with energy engineers at the Air Force Civil Engineer Center's Tyndall Detachment last month to strengthen and expand the partnership between the two agencies.

Discussions centered on energy savings performance contracts, or ESPCs; a new presidential memo expected to be released this month that will toughen renewable energy goals; and FEMP training opportunities.

"I consider this group to be my customer," said Unruh. "I want to learn how my program can serve you better than it is today. I want to hear if you're having challenges or problems. If the energy reporting is harsh and you have ideas for improving it, I'd love to hear them."

Unruh's visit is a follow up to one a year ago when he attended AFCEC's ESPC rapid improvement event. AFCEC uses FEMP's indefinite delivery indefinite quantity contract to award ESPCs to energy service companies. Since the rapid improvement event, AFCEC has rewritten the ESPC engineering technical letter that provides technical guidance to bases and major commands on how to execute an ESPC project; created an engagement policy between the Air Force and ESCOs; and centralized the ESPC contracting process at AFCEC. The Air Force also awarded one ESPC in Texas and released four notices of opportunity in Georgia, Colorado, California and Ohio.

FEMP is developing a national ESPC project database to give all agencies access to benchmark data, Unruh said.

"You and I know it's hard to compare most projects, but we hope if we get a lot of them together, we'll start to see an average," he said. 

The ESPC database project is a partnership between FEMP and Lawrence Berkeley national lab and will include federal, state and local projects. FEMP is working on security aspects now and wants to make entering information an ESCO responsibility and part of the contract. Phase one of the database is expected to be complete in June 2014.

"Everyone does ESPCs differently and uses different terms to describe the same thing," said Unruh. "We're trying to develop some standards."

The Council of Environmental Quality is leading the effort to standardize ESPCs along with the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers through the Office of Federal Procurement Policy.

Meeting participants also discussed a draft presidential memo. If signed, the Federal Leadership on Energy Management Executive Order would require federal agencies to use 20 percent renewable energy by 2020. Currently, the goal is 7.5 percent. Preliminary numbers from fiscal 2013 show the Air Force used 9 percent.

During the visit, Unruh also announced that FEMP has received "authorized provider" designation from the International Association for Continuing Education and Training. IACET-accredited FEMP training courses help prepare building personnel for higher-level clean energy jobs in renewable technology, facility management and building automation systems.

The courses are free, open to the public, self-paced and accessible 24 hours a day. To register for FEMP training and receive IACET continuing education credit, visit http://apps1.eere.energy.gov/femp/training/index.cfm.