SOLICITATION NOTICE
B -- Assessment of How to Increase the Demand for Home Performance with ENERGY STAR in the Affordable Housing Market
- Notice Date
- 6/16/2005
- Notice Type
- Solicitation Notice
- Contracting Office
- Environmental Protection Agency, Administrative Management Section, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, Nw, Washington, DC 20460
- ZIP Code
- 20460
- Solicitation Number
- RFQ-DC-05-00234
- Response Due
- 7/1/2005
- Archive Date
- 8/1/2005
- Description
- NAICS Code: 541620 This is a combined synopsis/solicitation for commercial items prepared in accordance with the format in FAR Subpart 12.6, and Subpart 13.106 as supplemented with additional information included in this notice. This announcement constitutes the only solicitation; offers are being requested and a written solicitation will not be issued. Request for quotation number RFQ-DC-05-00234 shall be referenced on any quotation. The solicitation document and incorporated provisions and clauses are those in effect thru Federal Acquisition Circular 2005-04. This procurement is being solicited on a total small business set-aside basis. The NAICS and small business size standard for this project are 541620/$6.0 million. Only one award will result from this solicitation, via the issuance of a time and materials purchase order. STATEMENT OF WORK: Assessment of How to Increase the Demand for Home Performance with ENERGY STAR in the Affordable Housing Market. In 1992 the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) introduced the ENERGY STAR label to identify and promote energy efficient products that exceed minimum efficiency requirements. ENERGY STAR is a partnership between EPA, the Department of Energy (DOE) and the manufacturers, distributors and vendors of high quality, energy efficient products. The overall goal of the Program is to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases and other pollutants by offering consumers the opportunity to purchase equipment that meets their needs and saves energy. The ENERGY STAR label is now on major appliances, heating and cooling equipment, windows, lighting, and more to include over 40 product categories. EPA has also extended the label to cover new homes and commercial and industrial buildings. Through its partnerships with more than 8,000 private and public sector organizations, ENERGY STAR delivers the technical information and tools that organizations and consumers need to choose efficient solutions and best management practices. ENERGY STAR has successfully delivered cost savings across the country, saving businesses, organizations and consumers more than $8 billion a year. One of the market segments that ENERGY STAR has not historically addressed, but one that stands to gain the most from the energy savings attained from using ENERGY STAR-labeled products and practices, is the affordable housing market. This market faces its own set of challenges and barriers to increasing the use of energy efficient products and practices, which are often more difficult to address than those faced in the traditional market. For example, low-income homeowners, because of the sheer demand on their time just to make ends meet, lack of education, or both, find it exceedingly difficult to find information and implement measures to improve the energy efficiency of their homes. And with energy costs comprising an increasing share of household income, low-income homeowners and renters are finding it difficult to pay for even basic living necessities. Now that ENERGY STAR has achieved prominence in the traditional market, affordable housing advocates are looking to ENERGY STAR for energy-saving solutions. EPA would like to expand its work on ENERGY STAR to address the needs of the affordable housing market and increase the energy saving and pollution reduction potential of ENERGY STAR. PURPOSE: The purpose of this work is to provide the Residential Branch of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's Climate Protection Partnerships Division with a study on how Home Performance with ENERGY STAR could be implemented in the affordable housing market. The overall goal of the project is to increase the demand for home performance with ENERGY STAR by expanding into the affordable housing market via existing initiatives and other affordable housing programs. EPA also wants to gain a greater understanding of how the affordable housing market (existing housing, single family, owner-occupied) works, including how foundations are thinking about the affordable housing market. This project will be conducted in two phases. In Phase I, the Contractor shall develop a detailed plan of how Home Performance with ENERGY STAR Pilots could be implemented. EPA's sites of preference for the Pilots are New York and Wisconsin. In Phase II, the Contractor shall work with at least two pilot sites to demonstrate Home Performance with ENERGY STAR and produce a final report providing a detailed analysis of the performance of the pilots and a broader discussion of how Home Performance with ENERGY STAR could be implemented in the affordable housing market. Phase 1: Developing a Plan of How a Home Performance with ENERGY STAR Pilot Could be Implemented in New York and Wisconsin. In this phase of the project, the Contractor shall: Task 1: Conduct a stakeholder meeting (or several, if necessary, to include the Ford Foundation) with stakeholders to include weatherization agencies, local home rehabilitation agencies, foundations, utilities, Public Utility Commissions (PUC's), churches, and other community groups. Task 2: Identify key champions in target areas -New York and Wisconsin. Task 3: Assess the key champion's ability to perform quality control in the target areas. Task 4: Develop a detailed plan of how a Home Performance with ENERGY STAR Pilot could be implemented using existing Home Performance with ENERGY STAR infrastructure in New York and Wisconsin. Initial issues to work out in Phase I include: 1) What are the value added components of Home Performance as compared to some of the more extensive weatherization programs that are operating in states like Wisconsin and Massachusetts? 2) What additional certification requirements would weatherization contractors have to meet? Are some of them meeting them already but have not formally applied for certification? 3) What resources are available? What are the added costs, if any, under the current programs? For some, would it be a matter of approach, with no additional costs? Are some already accomplishing the same goals, but just using different terms? 4) Are Home Performance contractors willing to work with the Contractor? 5) Can existing contractors be trained in Home Performance? We don't want to create a special certification that just adds costs but no value. What is the difference between a regular contractor who is skilled at including energy efficiency as part of the job and one that is certified? 6) Will state and local governments that run affordable housing programs consider including Home Performance as part of their rehabilitation/construction criteria? 7) What is the current situation and opportunity for development? Phase II: Implement Home Performance Pilots in New York and Wisconsin and Develop Final Report. Upon approval of EPA of the implementation plan developed in Phase I, the Contractor shall implement the Home Performance Pilots. Work under Phase II shall include: Task 5: Progress meeting(s) with stakeholders. Task 6: A final report, which shall include metrics not limited to: Number of Home Performance jobs performed; Measures implemented; How the jobs were paid for; The average cost per job; The Contractor's perspective on how jobs worked or didn't work for them; The impact on the agency's performance; The consumer's perspective - lower utility bills? Greater comfort Satisfaction with the contractor (timeliness, quality of work)?; A broader discussion of how Home Performance with ENERGY STAR could be implemented in the affordable housing market, including current benefits, barriers to overcome, and how Home Performance with ENERGY STAR should be implemented as a matter of policy in the affordable housing market and how a program should be structured. Schedule of Deliverables: Task 1. Conduct meeting - 10 weeks after receipt of TO. Tasks 2 & 3. Memo identifying stakeholders and assessing their ability to perform quality control - 8 weeks after receipt of TO. Task 4: Detailed Implementation Plan - 12 weeks after receipt of TO. Task 5: Progress meeting with stakeholders - 28 weeks after receipt of TO and 48 weeks after receipt of TO. Task 6: Final Report - 72 weeks (18 months) after receipt of TO. PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE: Date of award through eighteen (18) months. BASIS FOR AWARD: The Government will make award to the responsive, responsible firm, whose quotation is most advantageous to the Government, price and other factors considered. This is a best-value procurement. The Government may or may not award to the low price quotation. Technical merit is considered to be of greater importance than price. The Government will utilize the evaluation criteria identified below, listed in descending order of importance, during the evaluation of responses received to this Request for Quotation. 1. Technical Merit-The Government will evaluate the offeror's technical approach and the level of knowledge of working with low-income homeowners to sustain their homeownership by, among other things, improving the energy efficiency of their home. Knowledge of how to work with Foundations and of developing holistic solutions to helping low-income families preserve their home by integrating energy, housing, finance and related social programs is critical. Knowledge of how to form partnerships with other programs and organizations to provide funding and technical assistance is also critical. EPA will evaluate the uniqueness of the offeror's approach and is particularly interested in approaches that consolidate a low-income homeowner's information and support sources through one point of contact--for example, a social worker. 2. Past Performance/Experience-The Government will evaluate the offeror's demonstrated experience relevant to each task. This includes current experience (within last year) bringing federal, state and local partners including government agencies, Foundations, banks, and others to work together at the local level to help support the development of and implementation of programs to sustain low-income homeownership. Experience working at the national level to understand and address barriers to the successful integration of low-income housing rehabilitation, energy, social service and other programs will also be evaluated. 3. Personnel/Project Management-The Government will evaluate offeror's on the proposed staffing for this requirement, and their availability, relevant experience and professional contacts. This criterion also includes the extent to which any individual staff member has unique access to affordable housing stakeholders at the federal, state and local level, including Foundations. Finally, the skills and techniques used to manage the project cost, schedule and quality of performance will be evaluated. 4. Cost-Price -The Government will evaluate the total expected cost of performing this work. The Government anticipates award of a purchase order on a time and material basis. The Government's estimated level of effort for this requirement is approximately 325 hours. The provision at FAR 52.212-1 "Instructions to Offerors-Commercial" applies to this acquisition. Offerors are to include a completed copy of FAR provision 52.212-3 "Offeror Representations and Certifications - Commercial Items" with their response. The following FAR clauses also apply: 52.212-4 -"Contract Terms and Conditions - Commercial Items", 52.212-5 "Contract Terms and Conditions Required to Implement Statutes or Executive Orders - Commercial Items", with the following clauses cited in 52.212-5 being applicable to this acquisition: 52.219-6 "Notice of Total Small Business Set-Aside", 52.222-3 "Convict Labor", 52.222-21 "Prohibition of Segregated Facilities", 52.222-26 "Equal Opportunity", 52.222-35 "Equal Opportunity for Special Disabled Veterans, Veterans of the Vietnam Era, and Other Eligible Veterans", 52.222-36 "Affirmative Action for Workers with Disabilities", 52.222-37 "Employment Reports on Special Disabled Veterans, Veterans of the Vietnam Era, and Other Eligible Veterans", 52.225-13 "Restrictions on Certain Foreign Purchases", and 52.232-33 "Payment of Electronic Funds Transfer - Central Contractor Registration". The aforementioned provision and clauses can be accessed electronically at http://www.arnet.gov/far and http://www.gsa.gov/far. Prospective sources are reminded that award can only be made to a Contractor who is registered in the Central Contractor Registration (CCR) database. SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS FOR THIS REQUEST FOR QUOTATION: Each offeror shall submit (1) one electronic copy of their Quotation or (2) two original copies of their Quotation, which shall include each of the following written Technical portions required to be provided in response to the RFQ: (1) Technical Approach - Each offeror shall provide a description of their technical approach, detailed and complete enough to clearly and fully demonstrate an understanding of the Statement of Work requirements. Quotations which merely offer to conduct a program in accordance with the requirements of the Government's Statement of Work will not be eligible for award. Phrases such as "Standard procedures will be employed" and "well known techniques will be used" are not considered an adequate description. Although it is recognized that all of the technical factors cannot be detailed in advance, the techniques and procedures you plan to follow in conjunction with the task areas to be performed must be described in as much detail as the offeror considers necessary to fully explain their proposed technical approach or method. (2) Past Performance - The offeror shall identify up to two contracts, which it has recently performed (within the last 3 years), or is currently performing, that are similar in nature to this contract. The offeror shall provide the following information with respect to each of these contracts: *Name, address and phone number of all applicable contract points of contact, *Brief description of contract work, scope, and responsibilities. (3) Personnel. For the proposed personnel, the offeror shall submit resumes of its key personnel to include information on education, background, recent experience, and unique qualifications applicable to the performance of this project. (4) Pricing Information - The offeror shall provide, in writing, a detailed price quotation to include proposed amounts for any indirect costs and other direct costs, including travel. (5) Completed FAR 52.212-3. All questions concerning this RFQ must be submitted in writing and faxed to (202) 565-2554 or e-mailed to roberson.denise@epa.gov. No telephonic response to this solicitation will be accepted. Due date for receipt of responses to this RFQ will be 5:00 PM/EST, 07-01-05 to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, ATTN: Denise Roberson 3803R, Washington, DC 20460 via U.S. Mail; or to U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, ATTN: Denise Roberson, 1300 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW, Reagan Building Room 71271, Washington, DC 20004 via commercial delivery; or e-mail at roberson.denise@epa.gov. Electronic responses are preferred. Point of contact: Denise Roberson, Contract Specialist, Phone (202) 564-4899.
- Record
- SN00831445-W 20050618/050616212524 (fbodaily.com)
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