Leveraging Publicly Available Building Energy Data as a Design Firm in the United States

Publicly available building energy data are exploding—thirteen American cities and 14 states now require them by law. This emergence of data nudges building owners and tenants to reduce energy consumption by comparing their usage to that of similar buildings. However, vast untapped energy reductions and deeper physical understandings can still be extracted from these data. This paper extends the energy saving impact and provides key insight into building performance through publicly-disclosed data by describing three initiatives at a large design firm. An internal high performance design reporting program compares projects from around the world and across offices. A case study of 706 buildings in New York City illustrates the value of tracking large-scale patterns to a design firm. Per capita energy and carbon usage is correlated to life expectancy to better inform neighborhood and city design. As more data freely flow out into the public, engineers must strategically engage it.