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Testifying today on behalf of the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) before a House Small Business Committee hearing on "The Role of Green Technologies in Spurring Economic Growth," Cincinnati builder Andrea Lucke urged Congress to extend the New Energy Efficient Home Credit, which was enacted in 2005 and expires at the end of the year.

"The nation's home builders have the ability to profoundly affect sustainability and conserve precious natural resources and our environment," Lucke said. NAHB members build about 80 percent of the new housing units in the United States.

Lucke, president of the Home Builders Association of Greater Cincinnati and vice president of Robert Lucke Homes, also updated hearing participants on the progress of the NAHB National Green Building Program and the new National Green Building Standard.

The tax credit "is a key market incentive that shifts builders towards significant energy savings in new home construction," she said. "The program allows a $2,000 tax credit to a home builder who constructs a qualified new energy-efficient home, certified to achieve a 50 percent reduction in energy usage, thereby adding a highly efficient home that will likely remain part of the nation's housing stock for 60 years or more."

To encourage more builders to construct more energy-efficient housing, Lucke also urged members of Congress to increase the amount of the tax credit to pay for a bigger percentage of the higher building costs that are incurred when making a home 50 percent more energy-efficient.