In April 2019, the New York City Council passed the Climate Mobilization Act, which limits greenhouse gas emissions for buildings over 25,000 square feet. Pursuant to the Act, by the years 2030 and 2050, the emissions from NYC buildings are requested to be reduced by 40% and 80%, accordingly, with respect to the 2005 level.  The Act sets forth an even more ambitious target for the city-owned buildings: 40% by 2025 and 50% by 2030. Hefty fines are declared to be imposed on building owners for any emissions exceeding the limits. Around 50,000 residential and commercial buildings are to be affected by the Act.

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Mark Chambers, the director of the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability, said the cumulative cost to building owners to make the upgrades needed to meet the caps would exceed $4 billion. Accordingly, each of the 50,000 buildings mentioned above is expected to invest an average of [$4 bn/50,000], i.e., around $80,000. 

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Also, "Real estate industry executives say that while they support reducing emissions, they believe too many types of buildings were given exemptions, placing an undue burden for reducing the city’s greenhouse gas output on the remaining buildings. Ed Ermler is the board president of a group of four co-op apartment buildings with a total of 437 units in Jackson Heights, Queens. He said that in recent years, he has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars to install computerized boiler controls and other systems to make the 1950s-era buildings, called Roosevelt Terrace, more energy efficient, and yet the target that the city has set is still “totally unattainable”. To get down to even 20 percent from where I am today, with the technology that exists, there’s nothing more that I can do,” Mr. Ermler said. “It’s not like there’s this magic wand.""

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According to the NYC Council, buildings in the city account for 71% of carbon dioxide emissions. If AG-Cycle were implemented in all these buildings, it could reduce city's overall carbon dioxide emissions by around 40% at a fraction of the cost of any other solutions for emissions reduction in buildings.