Transportation Infrastructure: Where We Are, How We Must Change

Mass transit in and into NYC serves 15.1 million people, yet people still drive their cars into the City. The nation’s largest mass transit system helps reduce carbon dramatically in the City, and a new congestion pricing proposal is supported in NYC, but ignored in Albany. Learn from two experts about where we are and where we need to go to move people in and out of NYC.

Water: Life Blood of Our Infrastructure

NYC uses about a billion gallons of water per day, and the system that delivers it to our tap is both vast and frail, as is the system to dispose of and reuse our water. Water costs many owners more than energy, and sometimes property taxes. Learn about the system, NYCDEP incentives to reduce usage, successful retrofit projects, and the current and future state of NYC’s sewer system.

Demand Response Strategies

This session will explore the incorporation of techniques to increase performance in utility-based energy programs and to draw insights from current Demand Response (DR) uses in New York City. Speakers will review the benefits, concerns, and solutions encountered in actual DR projects, successful DR integration at one of the City’s well-known landmark buildings, going beyond traditional building efficiency initiatives during design and construction, and including backup power sources to ensure grid reliability.

Microgrid Solutions: From Building to Region

Microgrids are sophisticated backup power systems, both energy supply and demand, to strengthen overall grid resilience. Ranging from single buildings, to neighborhoods, and then to regions, they are able to operate if the main grid is down. This session will highlight a bold NY statewide initiative encouraging microgrid development, and describe both a citywide and regional example of proposed microgrids, their functions, and the institutional concerns to get these systems running.

We the People...In Multifamily Buildings!

Studies have shown that human behavior is just as important to a building's performance as energy efficient systems themselves. Engagement and training for residents and building operators is often overlooked, as the focus is usually on installing advanced new energy efficient equipment. This panel-style session will explore challenges and real life examples of how resident engagement, operator training and behavioral awareness have reduced energy usage in multifamily buildings and created healthier, happier living spaces.

Active Design and Healthy Housing

Active Design is an evidence-based approach to the development of buildings and communities that uses architecture and urban planning to make physical activity and healthy foods more accessible. Affordable housing represents an ideal target for incorporating these strategies, since lower-income communities are disproportionately affected by obesity and chronic disease, and often have less access to health-supporting resources. This multi-disciplinary panel will share how Active Design supports healthier housing for people of all incomes and abilities.

New York City's Data Revolution

Building owners and decision-makers of New York City’s largest buildings now have more information than ever before to understand their energy consumption and prioritize investments in new equipment and maintenance. Many building owners are undertaking efficiency measures as a result of this information, but they still face a range of obstacles to pursuing building upgrades, such as limited capital, difficulties navigating financing and incentive programs, and the complexities of undertaking energy efficiency upgrades.

Reforming the Energy Vision's (REV's) Effect on You

The electric industry is in transition. Innovation and increasing competitiveness of renewable energy resources, combined with aging infrastructure, extreme weather events, and system security and resiliency needs, are all leading to significant changes in how electricity is generated, distributed, managed and consumed. This session will describe how New York State’s Reforming the Energy Vision (REV) strategy will lead to regulatory changes that promote more efficient use of energy, deeper penetration of renewable energy resources such as wind and solar, and wider deployment of “distributed” energy resources.

Balancing Historic Preservation and Energy Performance

Historic New England’s approach to weatherization emphasizes preservation over intervention. But as shown by the energy retrofit that achieved an over 60% reduction in energy usage at the Lyman House, a National Historic Landmark, energy performance and preservation can co-exist. This session will discuss HNE’s preservation philosophy and how it guides the organization’s energy conservation projects. We will share an energy usage analysis of all 36 HNE properties and discuss how that information is used to prioritize actions.

Islands of Power – Microgrids Enabling Technology for Energy Resiliency

While the concept of microgrids and their attributes continue to generate hype, there are few guidelines on microgrid best planning and implementation practices. Microgrids must be able to function on their own (in islanded mode), integrate intermittent generation (such as solar or wind) with baseload generation, and balance overall generation with internal loads. Additionally, interconnection practices with the local utility grid are evolving for behind-the-meter installations.

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