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Following is a question by the Hon Tony Tse and a written reply by the Secretary for the Environment, Mr Wong Kam-sing, in the Legislative Council today (June 19):
Question:
The Buildings Energy Efficiency Funding Scheme (the Scheme) was implemented between April 8, 2009 and April 7, 2012 with a funding allocation of $450 million. The Scheme subsidised building owners to carry out energy-cum-carbon audits and energy efficiency projects. The authorities received nearly 1 600 applications, of which 870 were approved with total approved grants amounting to some $350 million, benefiting over 5 700 buildings. In this connection, will the Government inform this Council:
(a) whether it has comprehensively reviewed the effectiveness of the Scheme, the scope and amounts of the funding support, the vetting and approval mechanism and related benefits brought to society; if it has, of the energy saving performance of the buildings with grants under the Scheme, as well as other positive results of the Scheme, and whether the authorities have made recommendations and come up with improvement measures for the Scheme; if it has not conducted such a review, of the reasons for that and whether it will do so;
(b) of the respective general reasons for approving and rejecting the applications concerned; the maximum and minimum amounts of grants for approved cases;
(c) how the number of buildings benefitting from the Scheme and the amount of grants approved differ from the initial targets set by the authorities; how the authorities will handle the remaining funding of around $100 million; and
(d) whether it will consider afresh implementing the Scheme again; if it will, of the details and implementation timetable; if not, the reasons for that; whether it has considered implementing other funding schemes to tie in with its policies on energy efficiency and waste reduction at source, further encourage building owners to enhance the performance of their buildings in terms of energy saving and environmental protection, and create more business opportunities for relevant sectors such as property management and engineering?
Reply:
President,
(a) With $450 million allocated by the Environment and Conservation Fund, the Buildings Energy Efficiency Funding Schemes (BEEFS) were launched on April 8, 2009 to subsidise building owners to conduct energy-cum-carbon audits (ECAs) and to carry out energy efficiency improvement works. The BEEFS were intended to last for three years or until the allocation of $450 million was fully utilised. Among the 2,004 applications received, 1,115 applications have been approved. The BEEFS were closed on April 7, 2012.
Achievements in the past few years reveals that the BEEFS have helped enhance the community's awareness of the importance of buildings energy efficiency, and have mobilised property owners to take concrete actions to reduce carbon emissions and improve energy efficiency. Over 6,400 buildings, or more than one seventh of the total building stock in Hong Kong, have received subsidies under the Schemes. The types of installations involved in the projects have evolved from the replacement of lighting installations, which is relatively easy to implement, to large-scale projects involving replacement of central air-conditioning and lifts.
The BEEFS have also encouraged cross-sectoral co-operation between the engineering and property management sectors to grasp the opportunities brought by low-carbon economy. Since the launch of the BEEFS, over 20 training courses on energy and carbon audits have been offered for about 1,200 people by various training institutes and organisations.
For ECAs, they have been carried out in more and more buildings, and have helped identify room for energy saving and carbon reduction. There were also cases where energy improvement proposals as recommended upon completion of ECAs had been implemented with subsidies from BEEFS. The success of the BEEFS has helped lay a solid foundation for the full implementation of the mandatory Buildings Energy Code.
Upon completion of the energy efficiency projects, subsidy recipients are required to submit reports setting out the information on energy consumption of the installations, and professional evaluation of the results of energy conservation. The information is sufficient to reflect the effectiveness of the projects. It is estimated that the total energy saving achieved by the approved project would amount to around 180 million kWh per annum (about 126,000 tonnes carbon dioxide emission).
(b) There were 1,115 applications approved under the BEEFS which constituted about 56% of the total applications. Among the approved applications, the highest amount of subsidies per building reached the cap of $0.5 million per building, and the lowest amount per building is about $3,000. There were 889 applications that have not been approved for reasons including failure to submit sufficient information for further processing; failure to meet the eligibility requirements (e.g. applicants not falling into the category of qualified applicants or organisations); non-compliance with the application procedures (e.g. award or completion of contracts before the applications were approved); withdrawal by applicants; and the fact that the allocated funds have been fully committed.
(c) The $450 million allocation has been fully allocated or committed for the benefits of over 6,400 buildings.
(d) The BEEFS was closed on April 7, 2012 as scheduled. We consider that the BEEFS have achieved their intended purposes, namely, promoting the building owners' awareness of the benefits of building energy efficiency and encouraging them to take concrete action to seek improvements. The BEEFS have also been successful in motivating relevant sectors to grasp the business opportunities brought about by improving building energy efficiency. With services provided by the engineering sector and facilitation by the property management sector, building owners are well supported to pursue energy efficiency initiatives for their buildings.
We will continue to promote the enhancement of building energy efficiency, including the full operation of the Buildings Energy Efficiency Ordinance for building energy efficiency improvement. The Administration will regularly review the minimum energy efficiency standards prescribed in the Building Energy Code. Moreover, the Environment and Conservation Fund will continue to enhance the environmental performance of buildings through supporting various schemes such as the Source Separation of Waste Programme and Food Waste Recycling Projects in Housing Estates, etc.
Ends/Wednesday, June 19, 2013
Issued at HKT 15:20
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