(Photo Credit: Friscocali, Flickr Creative Commons)

The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) released a toolkit to help municipalities voluntarily adopt higher energy efficiency standards for new and renovated buildings.

Called the NYStretch Energy Code – 2020, the toolkit shares best practice standards that NYSERDA developed with guidance from a 25-member group of public and private stakeholders.

“Communities that adopt and implement NYStretch will accelerate energy cost savings, reduce emissions from buildings, improve resiliency from power disruptions, and lower utility bills for New York consumers,” according to the public benefit corporation.

As NYSERDA explains, a stretch energy code is one that’s more efficient than the state’s base energy code. The corporation expects the new toolkit to provide roughly 11% in energy cost savings over the model energy codes that are the basis for New York State’s 2020 Energy Conservation Construction Code, known as 2020 ECCC-NYS. NYSERDA estimates simple paybacks in the six- to 12-year range.

Currently 30% of New York’s overall emissions come from onsite fuel combustion in buildings, and 15% from electricity generation, the corporation noted.

Richard Yancey, executive director of the Building Energy Exchange, a center for excellence aimed at reducing the effects of climate change on the built environment, praised the toolkit. “The new NYStretch energy code promises to help curb harmful emissions from our building sector, and get us another step closer to the state’s ambitious goal of an 85% overall reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2050,” he said.

Earlier this year, Governor Andrew Cuomo established a Green New Deal climate change program to put New York on a path to becoming carbon-neutral across different economic sectors.