Incentives for Municipal Governments

With decades of field experience and technical expertise under our belt, SWA maintains smart and efficient working relationships with a wide range of energy incentive programs and efficiency efforts for municipal governments. As state governments enact legislation and allocate funds toward greening residential, commercial and institutional buildings, SWA helps owners and developers benefit from both the environmental and financial benefits of going green.

New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA)

FlexTech Program
FlexTech helps facilities access objective customized building energy information through cost-shared energy studies. The studies cover a range of energy usage aspects, including peak load reduction and load management, retro-commissioning, and Combined Heat & Power (CHP) and renewable energy feasibility.

FlexTech cost-shared energy studies are available to industrial, commercial, institutional, state, municipal, nonprofit, healthcare, public and private K-12 school, college, and university facilities.

FlexTech Energy Audit
Customers with an average electric demand of 100kW or less may be eligible for a low-cost, walkthrough energy audit.

Small businesses and nonprofits are eligible for a free audit. State and local governments are eligible for audits on a cost-shared basis, with a $100 fee for facilities with 10 or fewer employees and a $400 fee for facilities with greater than 10 employees.

New Jersey Clean Energy

The New Jersey Clean Energy program offers a multitude of financial incentives for all customer types, ranging from solar/wind credits and rebates to free benchmarking. Through the NJ SmartStart program, customers can receive incentives for equipment upgrades. Funding is also available through the comprehensive Pay for Performance Program and through cost-sharing in the Direct Install program.

Pay for Performance Program (P4P)
Launched in March 2009, New Jersey Clean Energy’s Pay for Performance (P4P) Program offers incentives to existing commercial, industrial, institutional, municipal, educational, healthcare, and multifamily buildings with an average annual peak kW demand electricity usage of more than 100 kW (with exceptions for some building types). As part of the program’s partner network, SWA is qualified to help owners and developers approach building upgrades comprehensively with P4P.

SWA is a P4P-approved ENERGY STAR® Partner. SWA audits the project site, develops an Energy Reduction Plan, and makes recommendations to reduce operating costs. SWA then maps out a financial plan for funding energy efficiency measures and a construction schedule for installation. The P4P program uses the ENERGY STAR Program Portfolio Manager. Thus, buildings participating in P4P also become eligible to earn the ENERGY STAR. Moreover, buildings that earn the ENERGY STAR through P4P can also qualify for a Combined Heat and Power installation incentive.

Local Government Energy Audit (LGEA)
SWA is a pre-qualified auditing firm for New Jersey's Clean Energy Local Government Energy Audit (LGEA) Program. Incentives are available to New Jersey–based municipalities, school districts, housing authorities, nonprofits, and state colleges and universities, covering up to 100% of the cost for an energy audit. SWA has worked with 90 municipalities to perform over 400 audits in the past two years. Each audit was performed in less than 60 days and has projected more than 35 million kWh and 4.7 million therms in savings.

SWA follows ASHRAE Level II energy audit standards to determine energy saving measures and performs an investment grade audit on lighting systems, yielding a set of recommended energy efficiency improvements. To maximize LGEA incentive earnings, participating buildings must implement a minimum cost’s worth of these efficiency measures within one year of the audit report. The LGEA program complements NJ Clean Energy’s other programs, such as Pay-for-Performance, which incentivize improvements.