New Legislation Introduced Intended to Save Money, Improve Energy Usage in Federal Buildings
The legislation addresses a number of ways to achieve high-performance buildings: life-cycle cost analysis, integrated design processes, building information modeling (BIM) and building commissioning.
The legislation provisions would:
•Use life-cycle cost analysis to assure that overall spending on design, construction and operations and maintenance reflects the best use of agency funds. Agencies should consider the total cost of ownership of their buildings, including operating costs.
•Provide federal agencies with access to the tools and techniques that facilitate the development of high-performance buildings, including building information modeling (BIM), commissioning and integrated design processes, to assure that buildings are designed and operate with the greatest levels of efficiency.
•Share results, lessons learned and case studies from federal buildings to improve both public and private sector buildings, thus saving money while improving performance.
•Update regulations for the use of energy and water in federal buildings to reflect the most current codes and standards being used in the private sector. This would reduce costs in the design of buildings by allowing design teams to use familiar practices and procedures to demonstrate compliance.
H.R.3371 – To produce high-performance Federal buildings through an improved approach to building utilization, design, construction, and operations and maintenance, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep Carnahan, Russ [MO-3] (introduced 11/4/2011) Cosponsors (15)
Latest Major Action: 11/4/2011 Referred to House committee.
Status: Referred to the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, and in addition to the Committee on Energy and Commerce, for a period to be subsequently determined by the Speaker, in each case for consideration of such provisions as fall within the jurisdiction of the committee concerned.
