From the Editor
It was a double-whammy of bad news this past April. First, the Energy Information Administration (EIA) announced that data it had collected from the 2007 version of the Commercial Building Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS) had “not yielded valid statistical estimates of building counts, energy characteristics, consumption, and expenditures.” And therefore, data would not be released.

Then, because the new budget Congress passed this spring cut EIA’s funding by more than 14 percent (about $15.2 million), the organization announced it wouldn’t be putting out the 2011 survey as planned.

So, essentially, the database that is the backbone for the Energy Star for Buildings program specifically and energy benchmarking in general, is permanently stuck in 2003. And so for the last several months, industry stakeholders have collectively turned to each other, shrugged and wondered “What the heck do we do now?” 

But there may be hope. As reported by Greenbiz.com last week, the two chairs of the High-Performance Building Congressional Caucus Coalition (HPBCCC), Judy Biggert, Republican of Illinois, and Russ Carnahan, Democrat of Missouri, recently went before the House of Representatives, as part of the debt ceiling conversation, to argue that CBECS be re-funded in 2012. The cost would be relatively modest: $4 million per year for three years.

As Greenbiz points out, the effort to save CBECS is still very much in its early stages, but the fact that the effort is bipartisan is significant — since almost nothing is bipartisan these days. So this is good news, but only time will tell how good the news really is.

What’s your take? How important is CBECS data to your facility management operation? Do you use Energy Star for Buildings to benchmark, and therefore, is it significant to you that the data are already eight years old? 

I'm interested to hear what you think. And, surely, the HPBCCC does too. Here are the members of the caucus — click on each link for information on how to contact them.

Cheers,

Greg Zimmerman, editor  

Green Strategies
Common Sense Strategies For Energy Efficiency

In the News
ISO Publishes Standard 50001
The International Organization for Standardization has published a new standard for energy management systems. The standard is designed to help companies make better use of their energy-consuming assets, evaluate and prioritize the implementation of energy-efficient technology, and promote efficiency throughout the supply chain.

Green Multimedia
Energy Benchmarking When Energy Star Doesn’t Apply
David Thomas, operations manager of the Austin Convention Center, talks about how to overcome the challenges of energy benchmarking in a specialized facility.

GreenTech Conference & Exposition

Best Practices in Energy Management
This presentation from the 2011 GreenTech Conference & Exposition by Richard Lubinski, president of Think Energy Management, LLC, gives facility managers a long list of energy-related best practices, from demand-side management, to conducting energy audits, to benchmarking.