5 tips for the C.E.C. benchmarking deadline

Spring is here, and for Property Managers in California, this means that it’s time to review your energy data from 2018 to make sure that everything is ready for the CEC June 1st benchmarking deadline. Here are some tips to help ensure that your building complies with the requirements for AB 802.

Determine your data requirements

The California Energy Commission requires that buildings with more than 50,000 square feet of gross floor area submit whole building energy data. The cities of San Francisco, Berkeley, and Los Angeles have their own benchmarking requirements for buildings larger than 10,000 square feet.

Review your building information in Energy Star

Now is a good time to review your building information in its Energy Star Portfolio account, such as weekly operating hours and number of workers, to make sure that any changes in building usage have been updated in Portfolio Manager.

Double check your electric and gas meter information

Make sure that 2018 usage has been recorded in Portfolio Manager and that any bill corrections have been captured. Meters that have information transferred directly from PG&E should be checked carefully, as there was a software problem that transferred incorrect usage values during 2018. If you haven’t updated your 2018 data, you can easily download the information that you need from your Gridium Account and upload the values to Portfolio Manager.

Understand the local benchmarking requirements

You may be required to conduct an energy efficiency audit every 5 years if your building doesn’t meet certain standards. In San Francisco, buildings must have received an Energy Star score of 75 or higher for 3 of the last 5 years to be exempt from the audit requirement (and scores formulas are changing). Make sure to check your building’s status early enough to allow enough time to schedule an audit with a certified Energy Efficiency Auditor to ensure that your building meets all local requirements.

Review your building performance

Did your electric and gas usage increase in 2018? Energy Star values were recalculated last year, causing many properties to see a drop in their Energy Star scores. Tools like Gridium are a great way to look at your year over year energy usage to see what factors are driving any increases, diagnose issues, and run measurement & verification on improvements.

Need more information? The links below can help, or feel free to reach out to us, we can help with any part of the benchmarking process for your building.