CalSHAPE

To date, Clean Air Allies’ advocacy has helped protect more than $100 million in CalSHAPE funding for school indoor air quality improvements.

A pro bono economic analysis commissioned by Clean Air Allies found that CalSHAPE-funded school HVAC upgrades yield an average 30x return on investment.

CalSHAPE stands for the California Schools Healthy Air, Plumbing, and Efficiency grant program. Established by AB 841 (Ting, 2020), it is administered by the California Energy Commission (CEC). The program funds infrastructure improvements in California TK-12 public schools, with the majority of monies earmarked for heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC).

At least 25% of program funds must go to schools in underserved communities, with additional prioritization of those near busy traffic corridors or Clean Air Act Title V facilities. As of the end of 2024, 50% of HVAC funding has gone to underserved communities. Unlike statewide bond funding, which has been criticized for being inequitable, CalSHAPE provides 100% grant funding, so under-resourced communities do not have to raise matching funds.

Since fall 2023, Clean Air Allies (formerly the California Alliance for Clean Air in Schools) has been involved with CalSHAPE outreach and advocacy. A timeline detailing some of these efforts appears below.

CalSHAPE is important from an indoor air quality (IAQ) advocacy perspective for at least two reasons.

First, it funds the collection of significant amounts of data about IAQ in TK-12 public schools through its comprehensive HVAC assessment and classroom CO2 monitor installation components.

Second, it overcomes a major barrier to better IAQ in schools, especially ones in underserved communities, by paying for HVAC system improvements.

The program was designed to have two phases. Phase 1, Assessment & Maintenance (A&M) pays for:

• comprehensive HVAC assessments, along with maintenance and minor repairs 
• adoption of high-efficiency MERV 13 filters if feasible
• installation of classroom CO2 monitors

After completing Phase 1, schools are eligible for Phase 2 Upgrade & Repair (U&R) grants to complete serious HVAC repairs, replacements, and upgrades recommended by a licensed professional based on the initial assessments. HVAC systems funded by Phase 2 must ordinarily use all electric equipment.

Unfortunately, of the more than 4,500 schools that have received Phase 1 grants since fall 2021, only 172 have been able to proceed to Phase 2 to remediate serious deficiencies. Program applications have been frozen since July 1, 2024, due to efforts to repurpose its funds. At that time, only a small fraction of schools had been able to finish Phase 1 and move on to apply for Phase 2, despite roughly $194 million in remaining program funds.

Because CalSHAPE was funded primarily by three years’ worth of contributions, from 2021—2023, from the energy efficiency budgets of investor-owned utilities (IOUs), it has become embroiled in broader state-level debates about utility affordability and what if any programs should be ratepayer-funded. This has led to efforts, beginning in 2024, to revert unencumbered program funds to the IOUs despite significant unmet school HVAC needs. As a result, Clean Air Allies pivoted from outreach, to build awareness of and promote school district participation in CalSHAPE, to defending it. Throughout, we have developed and widely shared deep subject-matter expertise around the program.

In mid-2024, Clean Air Allies helped mobilize a coalition that succeeded in defeating AB 3121 (Petrie-Norris, 2024), which would have reverted all unencumbered program funds to IOUs. As a result, approximately $160 million in program funds were distributed to school districts that had managed to apply by July 1, 2024.

Despite this victory, reapplications were not reopened. Meanwhile, existing statutory clocks — a December 1, 2026 funds reversion date and January 1, 2027 sunset date — continued ticking. In 2025, a bill to extend these deadlines, AB 832 (Muratsuchi, 2025), failed when the chair of the Assembly Utilities and Energy Committee refused to even allow a public hearing on the bill.

As of May 2026, Clean Air Allies is actively involved in a coalition making a final effort to get the remaining $194 million or so in funds to schools by extending program deadlines through the budget process.

Clean Air Allies’ outreach and advocacy efforts around CalSHAPE have offered a valuable education in coalition building, policymaking, and the dynamics involved in implementing school IAQ measures at scale. Sadly, they have also underscored the extent to which school IAQ still has relatively low salience as an issue among policymakers and the public, despite the multifaceted benefits of investing in school HVAC improvements:

• healthier and more comfortable daily environments for students and teachers
• lower chronic disease-related burden, e.g., from asthma
• reduced infectious disease transmission in schools and communities
• improved educational outcomes
• enhanced school resilience against closure due to extreme heat, precipitation, and wildfire smoke events
• greater energy efficiency
• reduced pollution from fossil-fueled HVAC equipment
• more high-quality jobs

Some of these benefits are quantified or otherwise discussed in a program cost-benefit analysis conducted pro bono by public health economist Dr. Richard Bruns for Clean Air Allies. Others are recognized in legislative findings and declarations in the authorizing statute.