City of New Orleans – Hitesh Goyal – 2018

Goals

As part of its ambitious Climate Action Strategy to cut greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2030, the City of New Orleans launched the Downtown NOLA Energy Challenge in an effort to help buildings lower their energy use. Buildings in the downtown area engaged in a friendly competition to benchmark and reduce their energy consumption, with prizes and recognition awarded at the end of the contest. The City is also planning to implement Energy Benchmarking Policy and was looking for recommendations for the policy. For help, they brought on board EDF Climate Corps fellow Hitesh Goyal.

Solutions

Goyal worked with the judging committee to finalize the parameters for the challenge and followed up with 40 participants to assist with data collection and troubleshooting. He ensured data integrity and analyzed ENERGY STAR Portfolio Management submissions to identify challenge winners. He then provided recommendations for the future versions of challenge based on the lessons learned during the first challenge.

Goyal also assisted in hosting five Big Building stakeholder engagement sessions and presented his findings to the building managers and representatives of non-profits in the city. He researched energy benchmarking policies of different cities and provided input on a policy that New Orleans could adopt.

Potential Impact

The first downtown energy challenge was a success, with more than 17 million square feet of the downtown area participating. With Goyal’s assistance, the City is in a better position to pass and implement an energy benchmarking policy.