The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Engineering and Support Center, Huntsville Energy Division is assisting the Defense Commissary Agency (DeCA) in developing a comprehensive energy reduction plan that delineates the path DeCA must take to achieve mandated energy reduction goals for its West Area sites.
DeCA, which consumes about 1 percent of the total Department of Defense energy, needs a roadmap in order to achieve the newly mandated energy reduction goal by 2025, according to Clyde W. Reynolds, DeCA’s Director of Engineering.
The March 2015 executive order 13693 (Planning for Federal Sustainability in the Next Decade) directs federal agencies to ensure 25 percent of their total energy consumption is from clean energy sources by 2025; reduce energy use in federal buildings by 2.5 percent per year between 2015 and 2025; and reduce water intensity in federal buildings by 2 percent per year through 2025.
“We intend to meet the new energy reduction goals,” Reynolds said. “DeCA hired the Army Corps of Engineers’ Huntsville Center to develop for us a comprehensive Energy and Water Management Plan and associated energy management organizational structure based on their familiarity with how military installations operate and their expertise in all areas associated with installation energy.”
The Huntsville Center Energy Engineering Analysis Program (EEAP) team will be looking at a total of 71 of DeCA’s West Area commissaries in the continental United States.
“We are developing a strategy that will enable DeCA to plan and execute sustainable initiatives to achieve their goals,” said Raúl E. Alonso, Huntsville Center's EEAP program manager. “We are recommending the steps they should take, and how to go about implementing them.” He expects to complete the project by February 2016.
"We will be developing a structure for DeCA to effectively implement energy conservation measures and address any renewable energy opportunities at facilities, including solar panels and geothermal energy,” said Mark Allen, the Huntsville Center project’s lead electrical engineer who is also a certified energy manager. “It is also important we address staffing and training of the existing workforce to improve energy efficiencies and sustainability across DeCA facilities."
Huntsville Center has an integrated energy program portfolio to help agencies develop and execute a comprehensive strategic energy portfolio. The Energy Division can execute a capital investment strategy for organizations through the use of one or more of the Center’s applicable energy programs. EEAP is one of various tools in the Huntsville Center toolbox to assist federal customers in meeting their energy and water reduction and generation requirements, Alonso said.
In addition to the EEAP, the Huntsville Center team taps into programs and contract management expertise within Energy Division and across the Center that provide customers a comprehensive and customized solution, to include the Commercial Utilities Program (CUP), Energy Conversation Investment Program (ECIP), Energy Information Management (EIM) Program, Energy Savings Performance Contracting (ESPC) Program, Power Purchase Agreement (PPA) Program, Resource Efficiency Manager (REM) Program, Utility Energy Services Contracting (UESC) Program, Facilities Reduction Program (FRP), Utility Monitoring and Control Systems (UMCS) and Meter Data Management Systems (MDMS).