Cities stepping up, requiring energy benchmarking, analysis

Kudos to cities across the country for recognizing the value of energy benchmarking and retro-commissioning.

By Mike Eardley May 16, 2013

Kudos to cities across the country for recognizing the value of energy benchmarking and retro-commissioning.

The Boston City Council just approved the Building Energy Reporting and Disclosure Ordinance which requires large commercial and residential buildings to report and disclose their energy and water usage and greenhouse gas emissions in order to encourage investment in energy efficiency. The ordinance comes on the heels of similar decisions by Philadelphia, New York City and five other major U.S. cities.

These cities are recognizing the powerful value of energy benchmarking and retro-commissioning to improve performance. Benchmarking a building’s performance enables us to understand how it is currently performing. Retro-commissioning takes steps to improve the performance of the building.

The steps these cities are taking will hopefully inspire others to follow suit. The systems and policies being created will enable us to harness energy use on a city-level and drive down costs while conserving key resources.

Our team at Cannon Design has been helping organizations conserve energy and reduce costs through benchmarking and commissioning for years now. We can speak to the value of investing in these strategies. It’s exciting to see Boston and other cities stepping up and we’re eager to help them continue to push these efforts forward.