The intent of the federal funds closely aligns with the purpose and work of the 10-year-old Relay Network, a collaboration of mission-aligned non-profit organizations and small businesses across the country with deep experience and technical skills in building decarbonization projects, practice, and workforce development. Co-founded by Elevate and New Ecology, other members include the Action-Housing, Association for Energy Affordability, Center for Energy and Environment, Green Coast Enterprises, Michigan Energy Options, Slipstream, Southface, and the Vermont Energy Investment Corporation (VEIC). Together, Relay and the Building Performance Partnership (a collaboration of Building Energy Exchange and the Institute for Market Transformation) set out to ensure that the GGRF funds created widespread benefit in the marketplace.

The first step was to create guiding principles for those being awarded the $20B in implementation funding for two of the GGRF programs, the National Clean Investment Fund and the Clean Communities Investment Accelerator. At a workshop on April 26, 2024, the following principles were presented to the GGRF awardees that garnered universal and directional alignment, serving to help clarify the program eligibility requirements:

• Institute a minimum (floor) for GHG reductions at programmatic level;
• Do not allow new fossil fuel systems to be installed with GGRF funding;
• Use the Department of Energy’s net zero emissions buildings definition as a guide, and to be clear on how to achieve net zero over time;
• Manage/limit use, volume and distribution of refrigerants being phased out by Environmental Protection Agency (EPA);
• Reduce the energy burden/insecurity, not increased, particularly for rental housing residents;
• Address health & safety barriers to do no harm;
• Prioritize local and minority/women owned contractors; and
• Seek a community-informed “localization” of the principles.

The first manifestation of the principles in practice was to align them with over 30 green building rating systems in common use so that certifications could be used as proxies to efficiently satisfy the eligibility requirements. A matrix of this information has been provided to all the awardees.  A second was to outline the contractor standards and qualifications for achieving renovations so that there is clarity around the training that will help contractors meet program eligibility requirements. One example of where this has been applied are the qualifications that were recently formalized by Enterprise Green Communities in their recently released Zero-Over-Time Certification pathway.

The GGRF awardees are actively soliciting for, and entering into agreements with, technical assistance providers to implement building improvement projects across the country. We have seen signs of some of these principles in what is being sought as they seek to create standards across their partners. The work now ahead for lenders that will be making decisions on the use of these historic, one-time funds is to incorporate these principles into their standard practices. These standards are critical to applying consistency for qualifying projects uniformly across the GGRF program for all investments related to buildings. Doing so is in the lenders’ best interests, as it de-risks their transactions, but more importantly, it is our best chance for achieving the significant, measurable impact intended and needed.

Marty Josten serves as Principal Director of Building Decarbonization at New Ecology. New Ecology is a 26-year-old non-profit corporation that addresses global environmental issues by bringing the benefits of sustainable development to the community level with a concerted emphasis on equity. Many thanks to the core team that collaborated on this effort: Lotte Schlegel, (formerly) IMT, Bob Dean of Elevate, Becky Schaff of VEIC, and Richard Yancey of Building Energy Exchange (BE-Ex).