Commercial buildings play a significant role in local energy use and electricity demand, particularly during peak periods. Local governments often want to improve the energy efficiency of equipment used by businesses, such as heating and lighting systems, to reduce energy use and manage electricity demand.<\/p>\n
To support energy efficiency improvements and manage peak loads, local governments in BC use existing authorities under the Community Charter<\/em> to reduce financial barriers and encourage voluntary action. These options focus on providing incentives rather than mandates, and include temporary property tax relief, targeted fee reductions or exemptions, and locally administered programs that provide financial assistance for energy efficiency and demand control measures. Each option must be established through bylaws and applied in accordance with specific legal and procedural requirements.<\/p>\n In BC, municipalities might consider pursuing this objective through business licensing, but they likely cannot require specific equipment efficiency standards through business regulation alone. The key distinction lies in the difference between regulating businesses and imposing mandatory requirements. Under the Community Charter<\/em>, the power to \u201cregulate\u201d is separate from the power to \u201cprohibit\u201d or \u201cimpose requirements.\u201d Although municipalities have authority to regulate in relation to business, that authority does not generally extend to mandating specific equipment standards. As a result, local governments must rely on incentive\u2011based approaches rather than direct requirements.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Local governments can use a range of incentives to improve the energy efficiency of equipment used by businesses, such as heating and lighting systems, to reduce energy use and manage electricity demand.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":764,"template":"","categories":[9],"class_list":["post-763","objective","type-objective","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-existing-buildings"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/objective\/763","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/objective"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/objective"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/objective\/763\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":886,"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/objective\/763\/revisions\/886"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=763"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/communityenergy.ca\/tools\/powertoact\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=763"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}