Riverboat Casinos and Casino Cruises-Then and Now


Long before the online gambling revolution and even before the boost of tribal casinos, a casino cruise was the only legal way to gamble in the US besides Las Vegas and Atlantic City casinos. Nowadays, gambling on a riverboat casino is only one of the many options that the recreational gambler faces when he feels like shooting dice.

The history of casino cruises and riverboat casinos in the United States goes back to the beginning of the 19th century when the Mississippi River was a major trade center for farmers and merchants. The river towns became major attraction for professional gamblers, also known as cardsharps, who were hunting the travelers who used to carry large amounts of cash with them.

When five cardsharps were lynched in Mississippi in 1835, the professional gamblers drove away from the south. The fashion of riverboat gambling remained as an informal routine between travelers. The two decades before the Civil War saw the pick of luxurious riverboat casino gambling.

The public image of the average riverboat gambler has changed a lot in the last century. If during the 19th century riverboat gambling was part of the frontier lifestyle, nowadays, a casino cruise is something you would buy for your grandparents anniversary.

The first State to legalize casino riverboats was Iowa in 1989. Now, riverboat casinos are legalized in Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, South Carolina and Texas. In some states, the casino riverboats actually sail along the sea, while others are anchored permanently and never leave the dock. The second type of riverboat casinos enable recreational gamblers to simply hop on a nearby casino and play their favorite casino game for a few hours.

The types of casino games available in riverboat casinos vary from one state to another. You can usually play slot machines and classic table games such as blackjack, roulette, craps, baccarat, etc. Some of the riverboat casinos also have poker rooms where passengers can play Texas Holdem against each other. Most of the casino cruises are family oriented and offer other activities besides gambling such as live entertainment for children.

If you are planning to take part in a casino cruise, you do not have to worry about cardsharps or a tough competition around the poker table. Most of the people who join a casino cruise are recreational gamblers who appreciate a good game of craps in between fine dining and sun tanning on the dock. In addition, you would enjoy a much nicer and patient service from the casino dealers and employees than in an average Las Vegas casino.

If spending a weekend on a riverboat casino is too much for you, you can try some of Florida daily casino cruises. ular4d If you take Sterling Casino Lines cruise, for example, you can leave at 11 am and be back by 18 pm. Sterling Casino Lines cruises take place on a 75,000 square feet gambling area with more than 1,000 slot machines and 50 table games.

Sterling Casino Line cruise is only one example from numerous options available around the states for those of you who want to gamble at the country rivers, lakes and seas. The variety of casino cruises and dockside riverboat casinos includes the most luxurious Las Vegas styles casinos and simpler alternatives. If you enjoy gambling just for fun and you tend to get sea sick, joining a casino cruise can be an enjoyable distraction for one day or for a whole weekend.

Online Casinos Vs Land Casinos


Online casino games are brilliant invention that completely transformed the field of gambling. They enable people to gamble with less commitment of time, money and inconvenience than before. Comparing online casino with land casino is like comparing apples and oranges, each appeal to different aspects of a player’s game. Let’s take a look at the advantages and disadvantages of online casino games as compared to the land-based casino.

The Surroundings: there is great fun and excitement playing casino games at the actual casino, but when it comes down to what important to the casinos – gambling the casino atmosphere is trying to dissolve and distract you… from your money. In land casino you are competing not only against the dealers and other players but also the casino crowd that watch your every move. One more disadvantages start with the trip to the casino. Depending on where you live, you might have to drive for several hours, or fly, just to get there., on the other hand, When you choose an online casino, you remain in control. An online casino can’t outdo you in the comfort of your own home. You don’t have to travel; you don’t even have to get dressed. There is something liberating and thrilling about knowing that any casino game that you could possibly want to play is available at your fingertips.

Money!! In land casino you buy chips with real money; in an online casino you will create a casino account and transfer funds into it. The fundamental difference however that in an online casino you know how much money you have at all times. The chips are only used for bets and the entire thing isn’t as puzzling as it would be in a land casino.
The most important thing is that online casino will let you play free, in a land-based casino you can’t enter and play practice games before you start betting any real money, but at online casino. No problem! Play as many free games as you want. Try new games that you are not sure about. Practice your game strategy. Play until you feel comfortable with the game and confident that you understand all the rules and secure with your strategy. In an online casino, you can play all the games for free, for as long as you want. Then, you can gamble real money only when you decide that you want to.

Are the games really different? In roulette, for example, there is a difference in the experience of clicking the Spin button in an online roulette game and the experience of watching the croupier spin a real roulette ball around a real roulette wheel. But beside that different, the game is the same. When you play roulette online, you play with a Random Number Generator that is programmed so that, over the long run, each roulette number will hit 1 out of 38 times, just like on a real roulette wheel. So the differences between them are really a matter of preference and taste more than any significant differences in the game play itself.

In slot machines, the similarities are even more striking. In the land-based casinos the slots are not mechanical “one-armed bandits” anymore. The computerized slot machines you would play in a land casino are exactly the same as the computerized slot machines you would play in an online casino. The only difference is that when you play slots online you are playing from the comfort of your own home, and you can get up and take break without losing your place at your favorite slot machine.

Security and privacy: there is no dress code in an online casino, an online casino will not try to film or picture you. You can play games in an online casino while wearing boxers and flip-flops. And you can do it with beer in your hand, a cigarette or whatever is it that you prefer. Play as much as you want and win as much as you want. Nobody is going to kick you out you can have full trust on online casino.

No one has the option to cheat you with the game. slot Online casinos have the latest state of the art encryption technologies to protect the players’ privacy. With the upcoming techniques and security proofed software you can have full trust on online casino. When entering an online casino, you should read their privacy statement! The security technologies that online casinos employ are designed to protect the player because he is the most valuable asset of online casinos.

300 Set Chip Poker Topi Atas Kasino Paulson Pharoah

Temukan misteri Set Chip Poker Paulson dan lihat apakah itu tepat untuk Anda saat ini. Silakan baca ikhtisar terperinci kami tentang Set Chip Poker Paulson. situs togel

Pernahkah Anda merasa bahwa apa pun bisa dilakukan saat membeli Set Chip Poker Kustom? Anda tahu, 300 Set Chip Poker Top Hat Kasino Paulson Pharoah dengan Artikel Review Kotak Aluminium proses berpikirnya biasanya seperti, “Saya ingin sesuatu yang lebih baik daripada chip plastik.” Atau bahkan, “Saya ingin hal terbaik yang bisa dibeli dengan uang.” Apa pun pernyataan berikut yang Anda miliki, Set Chip Poker Top Hat Kasino 300 Paulson Pharoah dengan Casing Aluminium dapat memberi Anda kedua opsi tersebut.

Hal pertama yang harus Anda pahami adalah bahwa Paulson telah ada selama bertahun-tahun dan dianggap “Top-of-the-line” dalam hal Set Chip Poker Paulson. Kami bahkan melihatnya di kasino dari waktu ke waktu saat kami bepergian, baik di Amerika Serikat atau di Eropa. Ini hanya untuk menunjukkan kepada Anda bahwa membuat nama untuk diri Anda sendiri di industri poker, mungkin memungkinkan Anda menjangkau seluruh penjuru dunia.

Namun kali ini, kami tidak membeli Set Chip Poker Top Hat Kasino Paulson Pharoah 300 dengan Kotak Aluminium sebagai hadiah untuk diri kami sendiri. Faktanya, kami sudah memilikinya. Namun, beberapa teman kami memuji daya tarik profesional dan kaya yang diberikan oleh Set Chip Kartu Poker ini ke seluruh ruangan. Ingatlah bahwa mereka tidak mengatakannya sekali pun, tetapi setiap kali kami mengundang mereka untuk bermain poker.

Jadi kami pikir 300 Set Chip Poker Top Hat Kasino Paulson Pharoah dengan Kotak Aluminium pasti menjadi hadiah mereka. Ditambah lagi, Anda tahu bagaimana sebagian besar hadiah ‘menikah’ berkaitan dan itu bukan kami. Siapa yang ingin membelikan seseorang panci dan wajan ketika Anda bisa mendapatkan sesuatu yang mereka sukai? Ya, jika Anda belum mengetahuinya tidak satupun dari mereka bisa memasak sehingga panci dan wajannya hanya untuk pertunjukan, percayalah.

Maka Anda harus memikirkan fakta bahwa kita harus menjadi orang yang memberikan 300 Poker Chip Set terbaik atau kita tidak akan pernah mendengar akhirnya. Kami mencoba memberi tahu orang-orang bahwa rahasia membeli hadiah menarik adalah mendapatkan sesuatu yang tidak ada dalam daftar pendaftaran, tetapi tidak ada yang mendengarkan. Kami telah mendengar bahwa kebanyakan orang takut mereka tidak akan menyukainya jika mereka menyukainya. Oh ya, lebih banyak penghargaan untuk kami, tapi yang terpenting masih sedikit sentimental.

Lihat, 300 Set Chip Poker Top Hat Kasino Paulson Pharoah dengan Kotak Aluminium yang kami beli hanya kami simpan sendiri. Kami memahami bahwa kami telah memberi tahu Anda pada awalnya bahwa ini bukan untuk kami, tetapi Anda tidak akan memahaminya. Jadi kami memberitahu Anda sekarang. Alasan kami memberi mereka versi lama dibandingkan yang baru adalah karena itu membuat hadiahnya jauh lebih baik. Mereka sebenarnya mengira kami menyerahkan kepemilikan poker favorit kami hanya karena mereka akan menikah.

Ya, kami melakukannya karena kami tahu mereka akan menikmatinya dan segalanya. Namun, kami belum memberi tahu mereka bahwa itu bukan masalah besar karena kami membeli satu set baru untuk diri kami sendiri. Mengapa merusaknya. Kita tunggu saja sampai mereka kembali dari bulan madu untuk memberi tahu mereka.

Aturan Bermain Slot Online

Salah satu permainan casino online adalah slot online yang menjadi salah satu permainan yang paling populer untuk dimainkan. Pasalnya, permainan ini tidak memerlukan pengetahuan khusus, bahkan seorang gamer naif yang belum pernah ke kasino sebelumnya pun dapat memainkan permainan ini.

Ada mesin slot online yang berbeda dan kompleksitas masing-masingnya berbeda. Aturannya serupa untuk setiap mesin dan tidak ada strategi yang digunakan untuk memainkan permainan tersebut. Ini hanyalah permainan berbasis keberuntungan di mana seseorang harus sangat beruntung untuk memenangkan harta karun yang cukup besar. Saat ini, mesin-mesin baru sedang dibuat yang meningkatkan kompleksitas untuk meningkatkan kegembiraan dan sensasi. slot gacor

Namun, mesin yang lebih sederhana direkomendasikan untuk pemain yang naif. Terdapat gulungan pada mesin dan tuas yang merupakan aturan dasar bermain. Saat tuas ditarik, gulungan mulai berputar. Ketika gulungan berhenti berputar, diperiksa bahwa garis di tengah gulungan berhenti hingga simbol yang sama dan cocok satu sama lain. Jika ya, maka pemain telah memenangkan sejumlah uang. Pada mesin slot online tentunya tidak ada tuas dan hanya ada tombol putar yang harus ditekan.

Kompleksitas mesin meningkat bila terdapat lebih dari satu gulungan. Jumlah uang yang dibutuhkan untuk bertaruh untuk memulai permainan juga meningkat dalam permainan tersebut dan jumlah uang yang mungkin menang juga meningkat. Di mesin slot online yang kompleks, ada juga bonus yang mirip dengan permainan video yang melibatkan lebih banyak pemain dalam permainan tersebut. Video game ini memberikan hadiah seperti bonus uang tunai atau putaran gratis. Apapun kerumitannya, aturannya tetap sama dan sebenarnya itu tergantung pada keberuntungan dan tidak ada yang lain.

Getting Casino Bonus Codes to Enhance Casino-Playing Experience


Obtaining casino bonus codes is a must for every player who wants to maximize the playing experience that he wants to get. Casino bonuses are ways for players to get free money or free stuff from an online casino. Those free offers can very well make them stay in the online casino longer. For instance, free money at the beginning (referred to as the welcome bonus) gives money to new players for them to explore the site as well as gives them an additional cushion to their bankroll so that they don’t have to worry much about busting out. Casino bonuses make players feel that they are in control of their online casino destiny; they feel that they can derive more enjoyment if at the beginning they look for casino bonuses that lurk around in the Internet.

Online casinos are only too willing to give bonuses to these players. Just as the players want to play more and have more fun, these casinos need more clients so that they can earn profits. Therefore casinos regard bonuses as essential; new players are always for the lookout for bonuses, and online casinos should cater to the new players, because these players will be the ones who will continue playing for many more years if they enjoy. No wonder codes for these casino bonuses have spread out all over the Internet. Experienced casino players who have played at multiple casino websites already can’t count the number of bonuses that have come their way while they are actively playing. They, of course, will also explain, if you ask them, how these bonuses have given them more security and more thrill in their game play.

Casino bonus codes abound in the Internet. Just enter these on a Google search and you’ll get hundreds of results. What we are concerned about right now is how to get the right codes that will work for you. Here are some tips for you to accomplish that:

1. Look carefully at the website where you will play. These websites often contain a welcome bonus for new players who want to gain some more money after the first deposit. Don’t just sign up without checking out all the bonuses that you can get; you might be missing out plenty of freebies. Usually, when you sign up, you enter a casino bonus code corresponding to the bonus that you should receive. Keep the bonus code in mind; if you don’t enter the bonus (or you enter the incorrect code), you’ll lose out the chance for the bonus.

2. Browse websites for bonuses found in the casino site where you will play. Bonuses are everywhere because casinos want to get as many players as possible playing in their site, so they advertise their bonuses on other websites. abc8n.club Search dedicatedly for bonuses before beginning to play at a specific casino site. Now, there are many bonuses that serve many purposes, but you can’t avail of all the bonuses for any given casino website at one time, so you have to deliberately choose the bonus or bonuses that you will avail.

3. Become a member of casino strategy websites. These websites offer bonuses only to their members. It is relatively easy to sign up to become a member of such sites, so better join. Not only will you receive bonuses; you will receive plenty of tips which will enable you to become a good casino player. Sometimes you can get free newsletters or free E-books once you sign up to be a member of these websites. You can also gain access to exclusive events, like tournaments.

4. You can also search for a specific type of bonus in the Internet. The welcome bonus (or the match bonus) can be found in almost all casino websites. For other bonuses, you might have to search. If you want a bonus that you can receive if you are an experienced player already, then you can go for a casino site that has a reload bonus. If you want to play at the real money tables without depositing anything at all, look for the no deposit bonuses. While doing all these – be sure to list down all the correct codes that you will enter when prompted.

5. Read reviews of different casino sites. Almost all casino sites have bonuses, but some casino sites have better bonuses than others. It is important to know the differences between the quality of bonuses received from each casino site. That way, you’ll go beyond the advertisements of the bonuses and you’ll look for the actual player experiences derived from these bonuses.

Apa Tangkapan Umum di Slot Gratis?


Dalam kebanyakan kasus, ketika sesuatu ditawarkan secara gratis, hampir selalu ada kendala yang terkait dengannya. Slot Dana Penting untuk mengetahui lebih banyak tentang tangkapan ini sebelum Anda menemukannya dengan cara yang tidak menguntungkan. Ketika berbicara tentang slot gratis juga, ada beberapa hal yang mungkin ingin Anda perhatikan, agar lebih aman. Dengan cara ini, Anda dapat yakin bahwa Anda tidak akan mengalami sesuatu yang tidak diinginkan di kemudian hari, saat Anda menikmati permainan Anda. Baca terus untuk mengetahui lebih banyak tentang bagaimana kasino online ini bisa mendapatkan uang dari Anda.

Batas minimal pembelian

Dengan memikat Anda menggunakan slot gratis, kasino berharap Anda akan menghabiskan sedikit uang Anda untuk memanfaatkan permainan gratis ini. Ini adalah taktik umum yang digunakan oleh sebagian besar kasino di luar sana, dan ini berhasil dengan cukup efektif. Oleh karena itu, Anda mungkin ingin membaca tentang syarat dan ketentuan ini, hanya untuk aman dan yakin bahwa pembelian Anda tidak akan mengharuskan Anda mengeluarkan lebih dari yang Anda perkirakan untuk menikmati permainan.

Penggunaan bersyarat

Terkadang, untuk benar-benar mengklaim slot gratis, Anda mungkin harus terlibat dalam beberapa permainan lain atau mungkin harus mengambil bagian dalam beberapa permainan berbayar lainnya. Ini adalah taktik umum yang digunakan oleh sebagian besar perusahaan, dan cukup efektif. Anda mungkin ingin mewaspadai hal ini, karena sering kali salah mengartikan gratis sebagai sesuatu yang lain dan akan disambut dengan biaya tambahan di kemudian hari. Oleh karena itu, memahami hal ini jelas merupakan hal yang berguna dan mungkin merupakan cara yang harus diikuti jika Anda berpikir untuk memainkan permainan cepat secara gratis.

Membangun loyalitas

Terakhir, untuk memastikan bahwa Anda tetap menggunakan kasino ini dan tidak pergi ke kasino online lainnya, kasino online tertentu menawarkan banyak pilihan slot gratis yang dapat digunakan di situs web mereka serta situs anak perusahaannya. Jadi, jika Anda tidak menyukai jenis kasino tertentu, Anda mungkin ingin memeriksa apakah Anda dapat bermain secara gratis di kasino tersebut atau tidak. Jika ini masalahnya, Anda mungkin ingin mencari di tempat lain dan melihat beberapa opsi yang lebih baik untuk bermain secara gratis.

Gambling at Online Casinos

Ever since the concept of gambling originated, there have been no downfall in its popularity. It’s an addiction that lures you to the casinos, where luck is the sole key to success. Regardless of your income, age group and qualification, there is always a chance to win millions and to lose whatever you possess. So whatever the hard work you did in the past won’t count here. mahjong ways

Being an internet dominated world, most of the of gamblers started gambling casino online, however, Las Vegas is still the hottest Casino destination of our planet. Earlier, gamblers used to cross into Las Vegas to test their luck and happened to enjoy winning and losing accordingly. The similar concept has been taken to the internet as well, myriad online gambling portals are putting across the opportunities to gambling online casino and enjoy online casino gaming.

Even with the advent of the internet age, the gambling industry didn’t suffered and still running successfully, yielding high profits. But it has surely transformed the mind-sets of the hardcore gamblers. Those who were habitual of visiting Casinos once in a week or month are now enjoying the same excitement while gambling online casino. Truthfully, there are some factors driving the gamblers to experience online casino gaming and do gambling casino online.

The first and foremost reason is the “home comfort.” The ease and cosiness that you can enjoy at home couldn’t be found anywhere else. Gambling casino online while being at home is entirely an amazing experience. You can witness and sense the similar excitement even at home, which you usually encounter within the exquisite vicinity of a casino.

Another defined reason that magnetizes gamblers towards the online gambling portals is the active mental stimulus. Obviously, while gambling casino online, you will concentrate more and end up taking more wise decisions. And that is why playing online casino games is a more lucrative decision than visiting casinos and playing in the hustle-bustle.

While gambling online casinos, you will find your analytical skills working perfectly and assisting you in taking confident and strong decisions. However, at the casinos, your decisions get influenced by the other people’s opinion, which drops your self confidence level as well.

The Importance of Casino Reviews


When you glance through the online gambling sites, you will most probably come across thousands on offer. At present, there are a countless number of good online casino sites offering you a variety of games to attract you to play with them. The attractive look of most sites is what allures more players but do you know there are rogue casino sites as well. This is where comes the importance of the casino reviews, which offer an in depth information of most present sites.

Why to select casino guide?

Today, there are many informational casino sites, which are more particularly known as casino guides. Casino guide helps you to know more about any particular site and all those features offered by that site. Each online casino provides you a variety of games that also include attractive promotions that lure you to play with them. togel hk It is quite understandable that while betting online, you have to deposit your hard earned cash. To ensure the safety of your cash, you require selecting an appropriate site to play.

Importance of casino reviews:

In the present date, the importance of casino reviews is second to none. There is no other way to know about the online casinos operating in the internet. The one and only way to check with the available sites is to go through the casino guides. Whether it is about the number of games, or payment options or on going promotions, a casino guide brings about the comprehensive information on the whole.

How will you know which internet casino is appropriate for you? What are those things that you should consider when you decide to sign up with any casino site? Before you get confused in selecting an online casino site, here comes few important tips that are usually covered in any casino guide. Go through these points and it will become easier for you to know what are the things usually covered under any complete casino guide or reviews.

Checking the legitimacy of an online gambling site: To ensure an enjoyable internet gambling experience, it will be important to check whether your selected site is a legitimate site or not. There are more of rogue casinos than the potential sites on the internet offering legitimate gambling enjoyment. Through a casino guide, you will be able to know whether a site includes the Seal of Approval from the recognized authority. Most casino review sites include information on the normal ways an online casino site operates in the web.

Rankings: Today, most online casino review sites offer you the top 10 ranking of the online casino gaming sites. This information will help you to select from the most highly reputable and legitimate online casino sites. Most sites that get a ranking are verified by the independent regulators like eCogra or E-commerce Online Gaming Regulation & Assurance. In addition, you will also get the audited payout certifications while playing with these sites. However, it does not really mean that sites that do not get a ranking are not good sites. The ranked sites form to be the most recognized sites of the lot so it will be better to play with them.

Customer support: The next point of importance is customer support. All legitimate online casinos offer better customer support. If you go through some casino reviews, you will find that most of them have focused on the offered customer support program. If a casino site includes facilities like that of live chat or direct 24 hour direct call service then these features are highlighted in most casino guides. It makes it a lot easier for you to select with the right site offering advanced customer support.

Banking options: Any casino guide of the present date includes information on the banking options. At present, most online casinos have similar banking options but there are exceptional cases as well. Information on banking helps you to select a site that includes your own preferred options to play your games confidently with real money.

Suited Blue Poker Table Cloth Critical Overview

 

Uncover the mystery of Texas Holdem Poker Table Felt and see if it is right for you at this time. Please read our detailed overview of Texas Holdem Poker Table Felt. jantan69

When you go to any local casino that isn’t situated in the major cities,Suited Blue Poker Table Cloth Critical Overview Articles you usually find one of three colors for felt. You’ve got the traditional green, the immaculate red, and the professional blue. While each hold their own in the casino world, we found something with a little more style. It’s a Suited Blue Poker Table Cloth that dawns patterns of hearts, spades, diamonds, and clubs. Personally, we’ve never seen anything like it.

Last year, it was given to us as a Christmas present from our best friends who come over all the time. They’ve had the privilege to play poker on our two Holdem tables and needless to say, it hasn’t always been fun. Most of the time, we were stuck out in the garage because there wasn’t enough room to put a table in the house. Oh just thinking about the cold nights with a space heater by our feet is a little too much to take without laughing.

Those were the good old days, but eventually we found a new home right next door to Jeff and Krista. It has enough room in our finished basement to hold about ten poker tables, but we’ll never have that many people over. Although, it’s a thought for down the road. In the meantime, though, they knew how old our table looked. We got it free about ten years ago from a church that was upgrading their own.

Anyway, the felt is old with several stains on it so it’s a bit sore on the eyes. However, Jeff and Krista gave us this Suited Blue Poker Table Cloth for Christmas and once we put it on, you wouldn’t even believe the difference. It’s almost as if we purchased a brand new table. In fact, we’ve had some others over since then who really thought we did. Now that’s a great feeling when a mistake like that occurs.

The Suited Blue Poker Table Cloth has unbelievable appeal, but it is the pattern that makes it stand out on the table. Plus, the particular blue that it provides is not too bright or dark. It basically leaves you with a professional style that looks like it could be sitting in a real casino. In the years to come, we may even end up branching out with some other casino style tables. However, all in good time because for now we are enjoying our new poker table.

If you’ve been looking for something out there or the Suited Blue Poker Table Cloth in particular, we recommend the latter. While blue was our color of choice there are several on the Internet to choose. One thing we found out, though, was that the site our best friends bought it from had fantastic customer service. Knowing them, there were a million questions they asked, so it must have been good.

Just know that no matter what you choose, the look is magnificent. We can’t even explain it to where you would understand because it needs to be seen in person. According to Jeff and Krista, the images online really doesn’t give it justice. Soon, you’ll know what we mean.

Commercial Casinos Energy Policy Act Tax Opportunity


The Casino Environment

Before the recent economic downturn, commercial casinos collected at least $30 billion in revenues each year from 2005 through 2008.1 During this period, US casino owners built new facilities and expanded the size of their existing facilities. As a result of the economic downturn, new US commercial casino construction has come to a screeching halt and casino operators are now focused on existing facility cost reduction.

The Section 179(D) Tax Provisions

Increasingly, casino operators are taking advantage of the EPAct IRC section 179(D) commercial building energy efficiency tax provisions, which have been extended through 2013. EPAct tax deductions are available for qualifying energy reductions in lighting, HVAC(heating, ventilation, and air conditioning), and building envelope. (Building envelope consists of the building’s foundation, walls, roof, windows, and doors, all of which control the flow of energy between the interior and exterior of the building.)

The Nature of Casino Properties

Commercial casinos often encompass hotel resorts, which offer attractive packages of services for their corporate and family customers. Casinos are particularly suited to EPAct because of their large gaming floors, hotel occupancy rooms, meeting halls, and parking garages. Each of these features typically consumes large square footage and the EPAct benefit has a potential for up to 60 cents per square foot for each of the three measures described above. Some of the smallest commercial casinos are about 50,000 square feet while most American casinos are typically over 100,000 square feet. One of the largest ones, MGM Grand on the Las Vegas strip is almost 2 million square feet. Hotels themselves are the most favored of Section 179 building category. (See “Hotels and Motels Most Favored Energy Policy Act Tax Properties”)

It is common to think of commercial casinos as located in two states Nevada and New Jersey. While it is true that these two states have the largest commercial casino revenues, there are 12 states with commercial casinos in the United States, the other commercial casino states are: Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Pennsylvania, and South Dakota. Members of the American Gaming Association have publicized some of their commitments to energy reduction. Reporting casinos include Boyd Gaming Corporation, Harrah’s Entertainment, Inc., and MGM Mirage. They have projects which include significant energy savings via cogeneration, ERV(energy recovery ventilation), more efficient HVAC units, replacing incandescent lights with energy efficient lightings, windows with energy efficient day lighting systems, solar thermal storage and numerous other energy saving initiatives.

The underlying rule set to qualify for the Section 179D lighting tax deduction makes casinos and particularly casino hotels the most favored property category for the tax incentive. The rule set requires at least a 25% watts-per-square foot reduction as compared to the 2001 ASHRAE (American Society of Heating Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Engineers) building energy code standard. Full tax deduction is achieved with a 40% watts-per-square foot reduction compared to the ASHRAE 2001 standard. The ASHRAE 2004 hotel/motel building code standard requires 40% wattage reduction, which means that any hotel or motel lighting installation that meets that building code requirement will automatically qualify for the maximum EPAct tax deduction.

Occupancy Rooms

For most other building categories, the Section 179D tax provisions require compliance with the bi-level switching requirement. The comparison is always based on wired rather than plug-in lighting. Casino hotel occupancy rooms have a major advantage in that they often use plug-in lighting, and because these rooms function as hotel and motel spaces, they are specifically excluded from the tax bi-level switching requirement. Since occupant rooms are usually one of the larger spaces in hotel casinos, casinos are typically able to use energy efficient lighting to generate large EPAct tax deductions for the facility.

Back of the House Spaces

Casinos often have large kitchen, storage, and laundry (so called back of the house) spaces that have historically used T-12 fluorescent lighting. 77wincom.store This lighting is so energy inefficient compared to today’s lighting products that it will be illegal to manufacture in the United States after July 1, 2010.4 Once manufacturing of these prior generation lighting products ceases, the cost of replacing these inefficient bulbs will increase. Simply stated, casinos should consider acting now to replace these lighting fixtures to save both energy and lamp replacement costs. The EPAct lighting tax incentive can be used to address the opportunities related to these legally mandated product changes