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Seattle’s Building Emissions are Rising – Here’s What the Data Tells Us

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Seattle’s buildings are responsible for more than one-third of the city’s core greenhouse gas emissions – and rising. According to the most recent greenhouse gas inventory, climate-polluting emissions in buildings increased 8% between 2016 and 2018, driven by burning fossil fuels like fracked gas and oil for heat, hot water, and cooking.

Seattle’s Energy Benchmarking Program collects and analyzes building energy performance data from more than 3,500 of the city’s largest commercial and residential buildings (more than 375 million square feet!). By comparing this data over time, we can investigate what’s happening with the City’s larger buildings (over 20,000 SF) to identify trends and create data-driven policies and programs in response.

Fossil Gas Driving Emissions in New Construction

If you thought the cranes dotted across Seattle’s skyline were increasing in recent years, you were right. Between 2016 and 2019, Seattle added more than 200 new large buildings (over 20,000 SF), representing over 50 million square of new construction. This continues a trend from past benchmarking reports where we are seeing an increase in the average height and size of new buildings. In fact, over 40% of Seattle’s building area from these larger buildings has been built since 2000.

Newer buildings generally are larger and have more amenities than older buildings, and are on average more energy efficient and have higher ENERGY STAR scores. But since many of these buildings are being built with fossil gas-powered hot water and heating systems – and because they are bigger – the overall greenhouse gas emissions continue to increase.

Recent updates to Seattle’s building energy code to eliminate fossil fuels for most space and water heating for new buildings will go a long way to cap growth in greenhouse gas emissions from any new larger buildings, but these changes will take time to phase in and be reflected in future benchmarking reports.

Existing Buildings are Reducing Electricity Use – But Not Fossil Fuels

From 2014 to 2019, total greenhouse gas emissions from existing benchmarked buildings increased 0.4% even as total energy use decreased 8.3%. Though the construction boom is driving overall higher energy use and climate-polluting emissions, a lot of older buildings have continued to improve energy efficiency – driven primarily by steady reductions in electricity use.

Since 2014, electricity use for buildings reporting complete data for all six years (2014 to 2019) has decreased almost 9% in total. But at the same time, fossil fuel use in the same buildings has increased slightly – on-site fossil gas and district steam use (which is generated from fossil gas) increased 1.4% from 2014 to 2019. Since Seattle’s electricity generation has almost no associated greenhouse gas emissions, the substantial savings in electricity use translated to little emissions reductions for these buildings.

In Seattle, fossil gas has about twelve times the amount of carbon emissions per unit of energy than electricity. As a result, from 2014 to 2019, total emissions from existing buildings increased even as total energy use decreased substantially. This highlights the need for more concerted efforts to reduce fossil gas use in existing buildings in addition to the new energy code updates for new buildings and Seattle’s other building policies.

Building Emissions are Distributed Across a Range of Building Types

For these benchmarked buildings, greenhouse gas emissions are spread across a wide range of different types of buildings, shown below. Hospitals, labs, grocery stores, and hotels tend to have the most emissions per building, but we have fewer of them. Multifamily (over 20,000 SF) and office buildings have a much smaller emissions footprint per building but make up a similar amount of total greenhouse gas emissions as these other types because we have a lot more of these buildings.

GHG emissions by building type (click to enlarge)

To help transition existing commercial and multifamily buildings off fossil-fuels and onto clean electricity to meet our climate goals, the City is exploring greenhouse gas emissions targets for larger buildings – paired with equity-centered support and incentive programs. To achieve the goals of the Climate Action Plan, Seattle’s emissions reductions rate needs to increase substantially. Find out how an emissions targets can help on our Building Performance Standards page.

To learn more about the Benchmarking program and how we use this data, see our new Benchmarking website.

Explore individual building reports on our Benchmarking map and reports site.

2019 Building Performance Data Published

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The City of Seattle recently published 2019 building energy performance data for Seattle’s largest commercial and multifamily properties. The data is available to view in Seattle’s Open Data Portal along with 2015 – 2018 building performance data. All five years of data can be downloaded and include energy performance metrics such as greenhouse gas emissions, energy use per square foot (EUI), ENERGY STAR score, building type, size, and more. Explore the building data here or summary statistics by building type here. Customized building reports for 2019 data will be available in early 2021 through our online mapping tool www.seattle.gov/energybenchmarkingmap.

Large Buildings Achieve High Compliance with Building Tune-Ups Requirement

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After more than two years of the new Building Tune-Ups policy, the largest buildings have achieved over 97% compliance. Congratulations! The first two ‘cohorts’ of buildings – Cohort 1 (200,000+ SF) and Cohort 2 (100,000-199,999 SF) – have completed 330 tune-ups to date, reducing greenhouse gas emissions across the city and saving money on their energy bills.

Building Tune-Ups optimize energy and water performance by identifying low- or no-cost actions related to building operations and maintenance. When done properly, tune-ups can generate 10-15% in energy savings and contribute to our climate goals. Tune-ups are required every five years for non-residential buildings 50,000 square feet or larger in the City of Seattle.

HVAC Operations Dominate Commonly Found Deficiencies

Heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) measures dominate the most commonly found deficiencies, for both required and voluntary actions (see below). HVAC set point fixes were identified and made in nearly half of all buildings above 100,000 SF to date. Tune-Up Specialists identified HVAC control issues or sensors that were uncalibrated, not functioning, or located inappropriately in 43% of the buildings tuned-up.

Voluntary Actions Uncover Additional Opportunities to Save

Of the most commonly identified voluntary actions, inefficient lighting equipment was identified in 47% of buildings assessed, with approximately 13% of all buildings voluntarily taking action to improve the efficiency of lighting during or after the tune-up. The second most common voluntary correction identified was the presence of equipment reaching the end of its service life, found in 44% of the approved tune-ups and acted upon in 7% of buildings. These voluntary actions represent opportunities for buildings to achieve deeper energy, carbon, and cost savings.

Smaller Building Deadlines Approaching

Owners of smaller buildings must meet the new Tune-Up mandate, April 1, 2021 for Cohort 3 buildings (70,000 to 99,999 GSF) and October 1, 2021 for Cohort 4 buildings (50,000 to 69,999 GSF). In addition to saving energy and water, conducting a Tune-Up can also help with preparing your building for operation during and/or after the COVID-19 pandemic.

All work associated with a Building Tune-Up must be done by a qualified Tune-Up Specialist, the experienced professionals responsible for conducting the building assessment, identifying required Tune-Up actions, performing those actions, verifying the work is done correctly, and submitting a report to the City. The Northwest Energy Efficiency Council (NEEC) has a directory of qualified Tune-Ups Specialists. This is a great resource for obtaining tune-up bids.

Compliance takes time, often between 6 and 12 months. Owners are encouraged to get started now to ensure there is adequate time to complete the on-site building assessment and follow through on required corrective actions.

Benchmarking Enforcement Action Delayed for Non-Compliant Buildings

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In response to the ongoing pandemic, owners will have until 1/1/2021 before enforcement action is pursued. At that time, owners that remain non-compliant with SMC 22.920 will be subject to 2nd quarter fines based on building size. See the Energy Benchmarking enforcement page for more information. 

If you need help complying or have questions about benchmarking, contact he help desk at energybenchmarking@seattle.gov or 206-727-8484.

Check Your Compliance Status for 2019 Reporting

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The online compliance portal for Energy Benchmarking is now available to check compliance for 2019 benchmarking reports. Once you have completed the Annual Update Checklist, you can check your building’s compliance status at the Seattle Energy Benchmarking Compliance Portal. To check your status, you will need your Seattle OSE Building ID or Portfolio Manager User Name.  Reports with possible errors will require additional verification to be considered compliant.

More information on data accuracy requirements here. 

If you need help complying or have questions about benchmarking, contact he help desk at energybenchmarking@seattle.gov or 206-727-8484.

2019 Energy Benchmark Reports Due July 1

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The City of Seattle has extended the annual deadline for
benchmarking and reporting of 2019 data to July 1st, 2020.
Building owners of nonresidential and multifamily buildings 20,000
SF or larger are encouraged to use the additional time to review
their Portfolio Manager accounts, update space use details to
accurately reflect recent building uses, and confirm all tenant and
house utility meters are included.

Starting in mid-March, you can check your building’s compliance
status online via the Seattle Benchmarking Compliance Portal.

2018 Building Energy Performance Data Available

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Seattle’s Energy Benchmarking Ordinance directs the City to annually share building-specific data with the public beginning with 2015 data. Building data is now available online for 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018. 

  • Find additional information on data transparency and summary data tables here. 
  • Explore the 2015-2018 data on our data visualization site here. 

Nearly 70% of Seattle’s Largest Buildings on Track To Be Compliant with New Building Tune-Ups Requirement

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Congratulations to the first cohort of buildings (200,000K+ SF) that have complied with the new Building Tune-Ups regulation by the March 1st deadline.

Seattle’s Building Tune-Up program requires buildings to optimize energy and water performance by identifying low- or no-cost actions related to building operations and maintenance, that generate 10-15% in energy savings, on average. The Tune-Ups legislation is a key piece of Seattle’s Climate Action Plan, our roadmap to achieving carbon neutrality, by helping ensure buildings don’t waste energy and water.

Feedback from Tune-Up Specialists has been positive, noting energy savings from implementing required corrective actions. Specialists have also noted that additional voluntary corrective actions have been identified through the assessment process, offering even greater energy savings opportunities for building owners. Tune-Ups on municipal buildings have shown similar results.

The Seattle Justice Center tune-up was an opportunity to optimize the building’s performance. Following an in-depth tune-up assessment, all required corrective actions were implemented and are projected to yield $35,000 in annual savings. By identifying additional voluntary corrective actions with a high return on investment, the City invested another $71,500 on energy efficiency measures that will result in $57,000 in annual savings. Combined, this Tune-Up offers a simple payback of 1.8 years. Read the Seattle Justice Center Tune-Up Case Study to learn more.

As of the March 1st deadline, nearly half of the first cohort of buildings (48%) were fully compliant through alternative compliance or by completing a tune-up, 8% of buildings were granted a one-year extension, and an additional 14% submitted incomplete tune-ups to indicate they are in the process of implementing corrective actions within the six-month grace period.

2017 Building Performance Profiles Published

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The City of Seattle has published customized building performance profiles based on reported 2017 annual benchmarking data. Reports are available via our online mapping tool, and include details on energy use per square foot, ENERGY STAR scores, total consumption, greenhouse emissions, and more.

With three years of comprehensive energy consumption data, buildings can use their customized profiles to track their energy use over time and see how they stack up to their peers. The updated performance profiles now highlight each building’s climate impact and how it compares to buildings of the same primary use.

Building Profile for Seattle’s Justice Center

Check out your performance profile here!

 

Energy Benchmarking Deadline Extended to July 1st

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The benchmarking reporting deadline has been extended from April 1 to July 1, 2019 for submitting 2018 data.

Nonresidential and multifamily buildings 20,000 SF+ must update Portfolio Manager accounts with accurate space use details and consumption data for 2018. All buildings subject to the annual requirement must be able to generate a 2018 December ending Energy Use Intensity (EUI) and ENERGY STAR® score (if available). Your account must successfully share accurate data with the City of Seattle Annual Reporting Portfolio Manager account by July 1, 2019 to be considered compliant. See our How to Comply page.

Compliance can be confirmed starting mid-March. Use the Annual Update Checklist — even if already signed up for automated energy use updates from PSE or Seattle City Light.

If it’s your first time benchmarking, get started with the Compliance Checklist.

 

HELP DESK – EnergyBenchmarking@seattle.gov – 206.727.8484