PETITION OF:

SECTION 1. Chapter 25A of the General Laws, as appearing in the 1998 Official Edition, is hereby amended by inserting after section 11A, the following new section:—
Section 11B. The commissioner of the division of energy resources shall develop energy performance standards for new or substantially renovated residential, commercial or industrial buildings that will contain fifty thousand square feet or more of interior floor space. The energy performance standards shall be based on their cost-effectiveness as determined by a life-cycle analysis. The commissioner may adopt separate energy performance standards for buildings within each utility customer class and differentiate between major building types within utility customer classes.
The standards shall, to the extent practicable; use methodologies employed under the state building code and are expressed in the total number of British Thermal Units per square foot for interior floor space to be used per year. British Thermal Units to be used in “off-peak” periods as defined by the rate structure of an electric utility or municipal light department shall be discounted where appropriate.
The commissioner shall establish and regularly revise bonuses for buildings which meet or exceed the energy performance standards set by the commissioner for the large new or substantially renovated buildings described herein within their building type and customer class, and the commissioner shall establish and regularly revise assessments for buildings which fail to meet the energy performance standards set by the commissioner.

The bonuses shall be established following an analysis of the costs of installing energy systems that meet or exceed the energy performance standards set by the commissioner. The assessments shall be set following an analysis of the societal costs of obtaining additional energy and capacity for energy production, transmission and distribution for the building including quantifiable environmental and other external costs. The bonuses and assessments shall be scaled proportionately according to the extent to which a building will exceed or fall short of the established energy performance standard for buildings of its building type and customer class. The commissioner shall establish and annually revise the energy performance standards and the schedule of bonuses and assessments, such that, over time, the sum of the anticipated assessments shall offset the sum of the costs of anticipated bonuses plus the administrative costs of implementing this program.
The funds from assessments under this section shall be received in trust, for the sole purpose of providing for administrative costs of this program, as determined by the commissioner of the division of energy resources, who shall act as trustee. Such trust account shall be spent or maintained from year to year without further appropriation and shall not be subject to reversion to the general fund.
Prior to the issuance of an occupancy permit for a building covered by this program by a local building inspector, the board of building regulations and standards and the local building inspector shall review the sworn certification of the energy consumption characteristics which has been received from the building developer or owner pursuant to section ninety-nine A of chapter one hundred and forty-three of the General Laws. The local building inspector shall not issue an occupancy permit until the board of building regulations and standards and the local building inspector verify that the building has the energy consumption characteristics so certified, and that any assessment that is owed has been paid into the trust account.
The gas and electric utilities and municipal light departments shall undertake an outreach effort to educate developers and building owners and others about this program and to assist them in making buildings energy efficient. With the approval of the commissioner, as a trustee, and the gas and electric utilities and municipal light departments may recover their reasonable costs of undertaking such an outreach effort from the trust account for this program. These costs may include, but not be limited to, costs associated with program development, training, marketing, quality control, and ongoing program evaluation.
The commissioner and the board of building regulations and standards may recover the reasonable costs of administering this program from the trust account established hereunder.
The commissioner shall establish and chair a public advisory committee, which shall meet on a quarterly basis to review implementation of this program. The advisory committee shall review and submit recommendations to the commissioner on the levels of energy performance standards, bonus and assessments. The committee appointed by the commissioner shall include:

(1) three representatives from the electric power industry,
(2) two representatives from municipal light departments,
(3) a representative from the gas industry,
(4) a representative from the oil industry,
(5) a representative of organized labor appointed from a list of five names submitted by the Massachusetts State Labor Council of the AFL-CIO,
(6) a representative of the board of building regulations and standards,
(7) a contractor who performs significant energy conservation work,
(8) a registered professional engineer with expertise in technologies intended to improve the energy efficiency of buildings,
(9) an architect with expertise in the energy-efficient design of new buildings,
(10) a representative from a community organization that administers fuel assistance,
(11) four representatives from broad-based consumer or energy conservation advocacy groups,
(12) a representative from the department of telecommunications and energy
(13) a representative from the division of energy resources, and
(14) a representative from the joint committee on energy.
Committee members shall be entitled to reimbursement for necessary and reasonable expenses incurred in the performance of their obligations under this section. Such expenses shall be paid from the trust account established by assessments collected pursuant to this section.
The commissioner shall, within six months of the effective date of this Act, promulgate rules and regulations to implement the provisions of this section, which shall take effect on July first, two thousand and one. Such rules and regulations shall to the extent practicable, coordinate existing building efficiency programs with the programs established herein.