Smaller Zero-Energy Homes Program Moving Forward

Solar panels on the roof of a home in Milwaukee. Photo taken Jan. 7, 2023 by Dave Reid.

It’s a smaller effort than once envisioned, but Milwaukee’s Environmental Collaboration Office (ECO) is moving forward on a program to build 25 zero-energy ready homes and a possible modular house factory.

A $3.4 million grant from the U.S. Department of Energy will fund almost all of the initiative.

“I ask us all to look at what kind of city we want to be,” said Alderwoman Marina Dimitrijevic when the Zoning, Neighborhoods & Development Committee debated the grant on Tuesday morning. The alderwoman, the council’s champion for its 2023-adopted Climate and Equity Plan, said she wants Milwaukee to be a place that is affordable, safe and working on cutting-edge projects.

Creating net-zero energy homes is a “big, bold, audacious challenge,” said ECO Director Erick Shambarger. It’s made more challenging because ECO is also working to find a private partner to stand-up a house factory.

The new grant is intended to fund 25 grants of $40,000 to private developers to “take whatever they were going to build and make it better.” It would fund the development of what is considered “zero energy ready homes,” where all electric appliances and highly efficient heating, ventilation and air conditioning systems could be fueled by a single renewable energy system like solar panels. Portions of the homes, primarily wall panels, could be built off site in climate-controlled environments. The grants would likely be targeted at developers working on other city housing initiatives.

The grant also includes $1 million for ECO to work with the Northwest Side Community Development Corporation on developing a modular housing factory. It’s a “more modest” version of Shambarger’s original vision, he told the committee, and would likely involve having a private partner fill space in an existing Century City building. From the award, $350,000 is also earmarked to work with UW-Milwaukee on training around designing and building the modular panels and approximately $150,000 would go to the Rocky Mountain Institute for implementing best practices. Almost $250,000 is reserved for a workforce training partner and program administration.

The program could have been even larger, but the council stripped $847,900 from ECO to build two demonstration net-zero energy homes in October. Over Shambarger and Mayor Cavalier Johnson‘s objections, the Common Council removed the funding in October and reallocated it to the Concordia 27 development and a guaranteed income pilot program for new mothers. Dimitirjevic, chair of the Finance & Personnel Committee, led the grand bargain with Council President José G. Pérez, but it was Alderman Robert Bauman who first advocated earlier in the summer to reallocate the funding. Bauman, on Tuesday, did not speak about the latest grant.

The program became a target for the Common Council in large part because ECO couldn’t spend the money fast enough. Using a late 2021 council allocation, it had previously awarded the demonstration effort to developer Nolan Gray and general contractor KPH Construction, but that project never moved forward. “Unfortunately, they didn’t have the ability to close the deal with their financing,” said Shambarger.

By the time the council stripped the funding, Shambarger had already signed an agreement with a second developer, Milwaukee Habitat for Humanity, to build the demonstration houses. With a deadline looming to reallocate funding, council members, including Pérez and Bauman, said in October they had been previously clear that no new agreements were to be signed involving the city’s $394 million American Rescue Plan Act grant.

The Habitat agreement has now been canceled, Shambarger told Urban Milwaukee, but the nonprofit developer could apply for the $40,000 grants when they become available in 2026. During the fall budget debate, Shambarger and the administration did successfully fight off Bauman’s attempt to place ECO under direct council control.

“All projects have bumps in the road,” said Shambarger on Tuesday.

The committee passed the grant award unanimously, sending it to the Finance & Personnel Committee Wednesday before it would head to full council for review next week.

Benchmarking Grant Approved

A second, larger ECO grant from the Department of Energy is also headed for council approval.

The federal department would provide up to $9 million to fund the creation and implementation of “Benchmarking and Building Performance Standards” — policies that are designed to monitor and cut building energy use in the city’s biggest buildings.

The proposed ordinance, cited as a “big idea” project in the 2023 Climate and Equity Plan, would require all owners of commercial and residential buildings over 50,000 square feet in size to annually upload their energy usage data to an Energy Star portfolio manager and share it with ECO.

As first reported by Urban Milwaukee in June, the idea was identified as one of 10 big ideas in the climate plan and would require less than 15% of buildings in the city to be benchmarked. But it could lead to transformative emissions reductions. Approximately a quarter of all greenhouse gas emissions in Milwaukee come from commercial buildings.

“Studies show that buildings that do benchmark their energy [usage] use about 2.4% less energy per year, or 7.2% over three years,” said Pamela Ritger de la Rosa, ECO’s environmental sustainability program manager, when the measure was first discussed in June.

The city, according to a grant budget, would use the funding to open a help desk, track submissions and provide building managers with support in reducing their energy usage.

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