In keeping with that theme, BOMA on Monday unveiled astandardized contract that building owners can use to reduce energycosts via retrofitting their buildings and at the same time financethose retrofits without placing additional debt on their buildings.The model contract, developed by BOMA in cooperation with theClinton Climate Initiative, is an agreement between an energyservice provider and a building owner in which the energy serviceprovider guarantees to save the building owner a certain amount ofmoney on energy costs each year by retrofitting a building. Inreturn, the building owner agrees to pay the energy servicesprovider out of the savings realized through the retrofit.

Brenna Walraven, BOMA International chairman and executivemanaging director of national property management for USAA RealEstate Co., explained in a press conference regarding the modelcontract that such energy performance contracting has been in placefor decades in the government sector. But energy performancecontracting has not caught on in the private sector because of anumber of hurdles: Thus far it has been costly, time-consuming anddifficult to finance.

The new BOMA-CCI model energy performance contract is designedto overcome those obstacles by providing a standardized contractthat addresses all of the legal and technical issues involved innegotiating such a deal, and it also provides a blueprint forfinancing the contract via a lease between the building owner andthe energy services provider. Henry Chamberlain, president and CEOof BOMA who kicked off the energy contract press conference, saidthat the organization sought to create "a turn-key program and asimplified contract" for building owners.