A revamped NYC Accelerator bets on its “Momentum” platform to push building projects forward

The NYC Accelerator program, which helps building owners navi­gate energy-driven retro­fits, is getting a long-awaited over­haul focused on climate mitigation.

In the past, the Accelerator was eval­u­ated on how many build­ings it helped, said Joe Chavez, Director of Sustainable Buildings for the Mayor’s Office of Climate & Environmental Justice (MOCEJ), which over­sees the Accelerator program in part­ner­ship with other city agencies. 

Now, it’s taking an even more active role in helping build­ings decar­bonize, because the agency will be on the hook for its own emis­sions targets. Specifically, reducing emis­sions by 1 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equiv­a­lent through the projects it supports, including a target for reducing emis­sions in disad­van­taged areas. ​“What we did,” said Chavez, ​“was to fully align it with Local Law 97,” and that law’s mandate to reduce emis­sions for large build­ings in the city. 

With this new set of prior­i­ties, the agency is rolling out a renewed suite of offer­ings, including in-person events and special­ized help for condos and co-ops. 

At the center of this new vision is a web portal called Momentum.

Launched in April and designed by the consulting group Cadence OneFive, Momentum brings together vast arrays of data on building char­ac­ter­is­tics, emis­sions limits, project cost esti­mates, incen­tive and rebate infor­ma­tion and more, and presents the infor­ma­tion in a way that’s action­able — even for a novice user. It lets build­ings connect with vendors and explore back-of-enve­lope budgets to do cost-benefit modeling for poten­tial energy upgrades. 

The promise of Momentum is in this wealth of infor­ma­tion, avail­able for free and in one place, to any New Yorker who needs it. Still, it is not a silver bullet. Jon Braman, who leads Cadence OneFive’s customer and industry rela­tions, said insights from Momentum can’t always make project budgets pencil out.

Many build­ings can’t just ​“pull millions of dollars out of their pockets and do some­thing”, Braman said, and the market still lacks enough financing for many build­ings to afford decarbonization.

Still, Chavez and others are hopeful that what the Accelerator can’t offer in direct finan­cial support will be balanced by all it is offering — not only the Momentum tool, but the events, train­ings and continued one-on-one support, including a new focus on climate resiliency guid­ance — to help building owners and resi­dents get decar­boniza­tion done. 

“This puts every­thing in one place. It’s really helpful for you to know what your next step is, so that you’re not making a misstep and losing time,” Chavez said.

The Momentum tool

The Momentum tool is primarily designed for deci­sion makers on major retrofit projects: think condo and co-op board members, multi­family building owners and prop­erty managers. But Braman said that the tool is avail­able for anyone to use, and encour­aged non-board resi­dents of co-ops and condos and even renters to sign up.

Once logged in to the Momentum plat­form, users can view carbon emis­sions and expected Local Law 97 (LL97) fines for their specific building based on its rent regu­lated status, square footage, and mix of energy sources. They can also explore energy upgrades that could lower emis­sions and fines over time.

A building’s emis­sions calcu­la­tions are projected as far out as 2050, as emis­sions from elec­tricity are expected to shrink as New York City shifts to a renew­able grid over the next few decades. At the same time, however, the emis­sions limit that trig­gers LL97 fines will also tighten, and sooner or later, covered build­ings using fossil fuels will need to pay fines or make upgrades. 

In the short term, energy-effi­ciency projects can help many build­ings avoid fines. Longer term, most build­ings would need to electrify.

To explore which energy improve­ments make most sense, Momentum users can mix and match upgrades to visu­alize both emis­sions impacts and poten­tial expenses and savings. This way, they can get a sense of the rela­tive costs and bene­fits of a project like updating boiler controls compared to, say, a full elec­tri­fi­ca­tion of heating and cooling systems.

Momentum auto­mat­i­cally models not just the savings from avoiding fines, but also upfront costs of these projects, as well as avail­able rebates and annual utility bill savings. 

Chavez says that while many sophis­ti­cated commer­cial build­ings already have these insights, Momentum can be ​“game changing” for build­ings that do not have dedi­cated sustain­ability staff, as is the case for many co-ops and condos.

“Most other build­ings would have to pay a lot of money just to have these insights in one place and we are bringing it to building owners for free,” Chavez said.

When build­ings are ready to move forward with projects, Momentum also offers project manage­ment tools. 

Authorized users, like co-op and condo board members, can request proposals from vetted vendors from within Momentum, then review consis­tently-formatted bids against each other and against typical project costs. 

Braman hopes this new approach will make plan­ning for upgrades less daunting for owners who are often ​“comparing apples to oranges — and very nervous they’re going to make the wrong decision.”

He noted an update in early fall that will also incor­po­rate infor­ma­tion on loans avail­able to finance projects, based on a building’s profile, scope of work, finan­cial status, needed loan sizes and terms.

Chavez said that the goal is for Momentum to augment, rather than replace, the Accelerator’s existing case manage­ment approach. Users will have, ​“some­body there that you can talk to, to help you say what’s the best next step,” Chavez said. 

Even if build­ings don’t use Momentum, they can continue to reach out for one-on-one support or find vendors and funding oppor­tu­ni­ties on the Accelerator website.

Program limitations

Momentum’s finan­cial modeling can help build­ings better under­stand their options, as long as they take those results with a grain of salt.

While the finan­cial models in Momentum are ​“a very good starting place,” Chavez said, they are only as good as the infor­ma­tion already avail­able in city data­bases about each building, pulled from Local Law 84 reporting. 

The modeling tool does not incor­po­rate building-specific docu­ments, like energy audits, that some build­ings may have previ­ously shared with Accelerator staff.

As a result, Momentum may suggest projects that build­ings have already completed, like LED lighting, or ones that are not possible due to a building’s partic­ular struc­tural quirks or co-op bylaws.

Likewise, to esti­mate costs, the plat­form relies on city aver­ages — although users who have already invested in project scoping work can also input their own cost esti­mates into the program, Braman said. 

Braman acknowl­edged that Momentum is also, in some ways, a work in progress, with more to come down the line. ​“Users can expect contin­uous plat­form improve­ment in the coming months and years.” 

With regard to the larger ques­tion of finding funding for projects, Momentum is not a panacea, but Braman encour­aged build­ings to sign up for the service anyway, pointing out that it can be an invalu­able source of information.

When new funding is approved, Braman said, users ​“can find out the day it’s available.”

In partic­ular, Braman and other stake­holders hope that a proposed update to the J‑51 prop­erty tax abate­ment being consid­ered in Albany, will soon make retro­fits afford­able for more condos and co-ops. In the mean­time, MOCEJ repre­sen­ta­tives told Skylight, J‑51 eligi­bility infor­ma­tion (based on prop­erty assessed value) is already being incor­po­rated into the Momentum platform.

Other changes at the Accelerator

The Accelerator relaunch, planned since at least 2023, is being led by energy consulting firm Willdan with eight other local consulting groups. In January, they won a $27 million dollar contract to manage the program through at least 2028.

The Accelerator is prior­i­tizing support for condos and co-ops, Chavez said, but for resi­dents of those build­ings that worked with the Accelerator previ­ously, the most imme­diate differ­ence may be getting used to some changes, including a new contact person. 

Pia Fouilloux, a MOCEJ commu­ni­ca­tions advisor, said afford­able housing build­ings will keep their existing case managers, but that most co-ops and condos will be reassigned.

Hal Fuchsman, the board pres­i­dent of the Inwood Park Apartments in Manhattan, spent years working with his old case manager, who in that time devel­oped a nuanced under­standing of the building’s needs and chal­lenges. After the relaunch, Fuchsman was dismayed to recon­nect and find that his new contact person was not up to speed on the exten­sive history of what his building had already done to decar­bonize and where it faced tough challenges. 

“For some­body who has spent a lot of time doing this, that’s really discour­aging,” Fuchsman said. ​“I’m really not inter­ested in starting from scratch.”

Fouilloux said the Accelerator appre­ci­ated the feed­back, and confirmed that all existing case infor­ma­tion and commu­ni­ca­tions were recorded, but said that during the program tran­si­tion ​“the new program admin­is­tra­tors, including case managers, will need time to famil­iarize them­selves with the compli­ance and tech­nical details of each property.”

The Accelerator is currently plan­ning a new ​“Condo and Co-op Hub,” currently staffing up for a 2027 launch, as well as a series of in-person work­shops for condos and co-ops, according to Chavez.

Foilloux said that this hub will help co-ops and condos address unique LL97 compli­ance barriers like gover­nance, stake­holder align­ment, and capital planning. 

“The Hub will provide tailored LL97 training to boards and prop­erty managers, and attend board meet­ings, stake­holder meet­ings, town halls, and site visits to address signif­i­cant project barriers,” Fouilloux said.

The Accelerator also plans to focus on decar­boniza­tion projects in build­ings that still run on fuel oil, and to help build­ings inte­grate climate risks like flooding into their retrofit plans, Fouilloux said.

Chavez agrees. ​“It is not asking the building to do projects that are unnec­es­sary or out of line,” he said. ​“The projects it is recom­mending are based on what the building actu­ally needs.”