West Village: A Process & Business Model for Achieving Zero-Net Energy at the Community-Scale

Integration of the Various Components in the West Village Community Process Task 1: Engage Key Players in the Design of the Business Model The WVEI started as an offshoot of the design process for the West Village neighborhood. [...] There are prohibitive up-front cost barriers for the university and the developer to incorporating distributed energy technologies into the community infrastructure while trying to maintain the required level of affordability for the home-buyer. [...] Adding to challenges associated with the infrastructure costs and the related financial challenges is also the issue of organizing the implementation of the technical and financial solutions. [...] Finally, the University will continue to own the fee title to the West Village neighborhood and all of the residents of the neighborhood will be University affiliates. [...] A fundamental project design hypothesis was that it is essential to have proper allocation of cost and value between the Utility, the Developer, the landowner and the third party owner/distributor of the energy infrastructure in order to result in net savings for all parties involved.