RETROFITTING FOR ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Cities occupy 2 percent of the world’s land mass yet contribute more than two-thirds of global greenhouse gas emissions. Two significant contributors of greenhouse gas emissions in cities are buildings and outdoor lighting systems. In fact, buildings can account for up to 80 percent of a city’s CO2 emissions; outdoor lighting systems can account for as much as 37 percent of a municipal government’s electricity usage.

As part of the Clinton Foundation’s effort to help some of the world’s largest cities to reduce their carbon emissions, we are working directly with cities and other partners to retrofit buildings and outdoor lighting systems with up-to-date energy efficient products, technologies, and systems.

THE CLINTON CLIMATE INITIATIVE

The Clinton Climate Initiative (CCI) Energy Efficiency Building Retrofit Program brings together many of the world’s largest cities, energy service firms, and financial institutions in an effort to reduce energy consumption in existing buildings and lighting systems.

CCI has launched several landmark projects in partnerships with cities – including Chicago, Seoul, and London – and key stakeholders around the world. For example, CCI is helping the Empire State Building reduce its energy use by 38 percent and energy bills by $4.4 million a year, preventing 105,000 metric tons of greenhouse gas emissions over the next 15 years.

CCI is also helping the City of Los Angeles replace 140,000 streetlights with LED units. Before the project began, Los Angeles’ streetlights used 168 gigawatt hours of electricity at an annual cost of $15 million, emitting 120,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide. When this project – which is the largest LED streetlight retrofit undertaken by a city to date - is completed, it will reduce Los Angeles’ CO2 emissions by more than 40,500 tons and save $10 million annually.

Learn more about CCI’s Cities Program.

THE CLINTON GLOBAL INITIATIVE

Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) nonprofit, business, and government members have also launched projects targeted to facilitate and finance retrofit projects for governments, companies, and residential homeowners.

For example, to help scale-up residential retrofits throughout Oregon, Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) member organization ShoreBank Cascadia has established key partnerships – with cities, the state, private utilities, labor unions, businesses, and, financial partners – to build a model for how retrofits could be implemented and financed. This four-year project has already initiated a 500-home pilot program that is providing financing to homeowners of all income levels for weatherization and water system retrofits.

Learn more about CGI.

RETROFITTING IN HARLEM AND AROUND THE WORLD

The Dutch Postcode Lottery, in conjuncture with Lemnis Lighting, will realize the retrofit of the Clinton Foundation’s Harlem office with LED lighting during the summer of 2010. Lemnis Lighting previously partnered with the Dutch Postcode Lottery to promote broad use of LED lighting in the Netherlands.

This project is the result of a meeting in 2006 with President Clinton and the Dutch Postcode Lottery in which this sustainable lighting alternative was introduced and the foundation was laid for the boost of LED technology in the Netherlands in 2009.

Since that meeting the Dutch Postcode Lottery has also made a commitment at the Clinton Global Initiative annual meeting in 2008, in partnership with WWF Netherlands, to boost LED technology in the Netherlands by giving 2.5 million lottery participating households a Pharox LED light bulb. These LED lamps use only 10 percent of the electricity that incandescent lamps use, do not contain toxic mercury, and will last for 25 years on average.

More than 1.6 million Dutch households have collected their LED lamp. The direct impact of replacing inefficient lamps by these LED ones is a reduction of more than 73.000 ton CO₂ per year. The broad multimedia attention resulted in an industry shift around lighting, and the awareness within the public that LED lighting is a solution for energy efficient lighting without losing quality.

FOCUSING ON LITTLE ROCK

From its bamboo flooring to its new, state-of-the-art green roof, the Clinton Presidential Center’s green design, construction, and operation reflects President Clinton’s commitment to sustainability. With its a platinum LEED Certification for Existing Buildings from the U.S. Green Building Council, the Center has served as an example and catalyst for green building and restoration projects in the surrounding Little Rock area. Working with the Clinton Foundation and other partners, the Center has helped organize a project to restore nearby wetlands, green a historic building, begin work on an energy-saving pedestrian and bike bridge, and launch a major retrofitting project for the nearby L’Oréal headquarters.

Read more about Clinton Foundation and Presidential Center projects in Little Rock.