San Francisco small business lighting retrofit: Case Study

Marc Theobald, Newcomb Anderson Associates, USA

Keywords

lighting, small business, municipal, program, efficiency, retrofit, audit, construction, San Francisco, California, USA

Abstract

The paper reports on the results of a small business assistance program administered by the City of San Francisco with the goal of upgrading lighting in 40 small businesses. The Program provided incentives to businesses as a means of overcoming market barriers. The Program was a pilot for a larger program targeting about 4,000 facilities, currently underway.

Through April 1, 2002, the pilot program paid an average of $682 US per kW reduced (783 EURO/kW) of incentives to Contractors on behalf of (13) end use customers, totaling 36% of the construction cost. The pilot program incurred additional costs of approximately $200, 000 US for administration (about 230,000 EURO). The proposed incentive strategy for the Full Program is to pay $290 US (333 EURO) per site and $195 US (224 EURO) per kW removed. The program will need to optimize the effect of marketing, auditing, sales, and construction activities to motivate businesses to participate.

The following sections outline the organizational structure of the Pilot Program, and detail the approach, results, and recommendations for future Marketing, Auditing, Sales, and Construction activities. Specific project examples are presented in a final "Case Studies" section, with the data collection form attached as Appendix A.