New for 2010: Building Energy Performance Labeling

ASHRAE's Building Energy Quotient label

Washington DC is leading the way in many aspects of sustainability, and may be the first place in the nation where building energy performance labeling becomes mandatory. Starting this year, the owners of approximately 260 of the largest commercial buildings in the District will be required to record their performance data in the EPA’s Portfolio Manager website. According to the Washington Post, the initiative has supporters and opponents:

Cliff Majersik, executive director at the Institute for Market Transformation, an environmentally focused, Washington-based nonprofit group, said the law should fix a long-standing problem. It's tenants, not landlords, who typically pay the energy costs for a rented corporate space, he said. "The people in the best position to improve the energy efficiency of buildings don't pay the energy bills, and the people who pay the energy bills are unaware that they could be saving money," he said. The Apartment and Office Building Association of Metropolitan Washington and the Cato Institute opposed the bill, noting that it calls for the District to fund a third-party contractor to conduct sustainable energy programs for the city. "It's something else that will make it more expensive to live in Washington or run a business in Washington," said Pat Michaels, a senior fellow on environmental studies at the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. "If left to its own, the market would produce these efficiencies better."

The Washington program closely mirrors similar initiatives in other states, notably New York and California, and at the Federal level.

• Section 204 of the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 establishes a plan for a national building energy performance labeling program. The Act, which also includes the controversial “Cap and Trade” legislation, is currently awaiting action in the Senate.

• California was the first state to draft energy performance labeling legislation, with AB 1103 in 2007, which requires that, as of Jan. 1, 2010, non-residential buildings release their Portfolio Manager-benchmarked data and ratings to parties in a commercial real estate transaction involving the sale, lease or financing of a whole building.

• In December 2009, New York passed the Greener Greater Buildings Plan, which includes the disclosure of energy performance for large commercial buildings by September 2011.

In June 2009 ASHRAE introduced a prototype building energy performance label, the Building Energy Quotient Label, which is currently being piloted. The Building EQ program is a more sophisticated version of the EPA’s Energy Star program, which has been in existence since 1992 and provides performance labels for buildings and appliances. In Washington, the building performance data will not be made public knowledge until 2012, giving building owners time to improve their scores by installing energy saving upgrades.