Many utilities offer incentives intended to promote the design of new construction (NC) projects that exceed energy code baselines. It is common practice to quantify NC rebates by comparing model-predicted energy consumption of a proposed design to that of a hypothetical baseline design. These predictive NC rebates are intended to provide a quick reward to the builder and design team for the added capital cost of efficiency measures. However, measurement and verification (M&V) coupled with this approach often falls prey to baseline models that are manipulated to claim more savings and do not meet IPMVP protocol.

Opportunities for procuring NC energy efficiency do not stop at the design phase – the commissioning agents, building operators and occupants play a significant role. Forthcoming energy codes, mandating not only efficient equipment but also efficient operation, will make the traditional M&V process for NC much harder. Outcome-based NC incentives would lead to a simpler M&V process that promotes full accountability for procuring greater NC efficiency. Outcome-based incentives would also be a more scalable solution to NC program design.

In this paper, we discuss our experience with one medium-sized utility’s NC program. We then examine model-based case studies to quantify rewards garnered by inefficient operation under the typical NC M&V process. We analyze actual performance outcomes from eleven buildings in relation to rebate predictions, and examine the variation in the difference between the predicted and measured savings among individual cases. Finally, we discuss potential alternatives for NC M&V using existing best practices and resources.