Energy Star Challenge

The City is participating in the federal government's ENERGY STAR Challenge and is encouraging local businesses and organizations to do the same. The ENERGY STAR Challenge is a national call-to-action to improve the energy efficiency of America's commercial and industrial buildings by 10 percent or more. Read about the Energy Star Challenge and see what the City's SASS (Striving After Sustainable Solutions) team is up to on our website. We are encouraging local businesses to take the challenge as well, and we will put those participation certificates up on our website.

Our application for Energy Efficiency and Block Grant funding from the US Department of Energy includes steps to help get us toward that 10% goal. That application is currently being reviewed. See what we applied for and what we hope to do to make the city more energy efficient.

To establish a baseline for this goal, the SASS team requested that MidAmerican Energy conduct audits on our thirteen largest city facilities. Audits have been completed for nine of the facilities. The other four - City Hall, Public Works, the Law Enforcement Center, and the Library - are undergoing a more extensive audit. By working through MidAmerican Energy, we are able to reap greater rebates from MidAmerican for any changes we make. I encourage local businesses to see how MidAmerican can help in evaluating and recommending changes for facilities through their BusinessCheck program- there are links on the SASS pages of our website for that too.

If you are a West Des Moines business that is making sustainable changes or using sustainable practices, let us know! We plan to promote any best practices out there.