AB 1103 – How You Can Benefit?

Commercial building owners, facility managers and real estate brokers throughout California will be challenged starting January 2011 when Assembly Bill 1103 goes into effect. The new energy performance rating system will provide energy consumption information on nonresidential buildings.

The building owner will be required to disclose the U.S. EPA’s Portfolio Manager’s Statement of Energy Performance and the California Energy Performance Disclosure Report before a building is sold, leased entirely or refinanced.

The California Energy Commission started the rule making process with the initial set of proposed regulations in June. The CEC expects to add several new sections (although minor) to the regulations prior to final release. The regulations will be finalized by December of this year.

The first buildings to be required to submit the Disclosure Report under AB1103 are 50,000 sq ft and larger or owner occupied above 1,000 sq ft.

Knowledge is the Key!

The Energy Star Portfolio Manager allows the building owner to track and assess energy consumption while comparing the building’s performance with a national database of buildings with the same operating characteristic. The result is a rating on a scale of 0 to 100, with 100 being the most energy efficient building in its category.

A verified score of 75 or higher qualifies the building for Energy Star certification, which indicates that the building performs better than 75% of all similar buildings nationwide.

Efficiency supports Profitability

A higher rating means lower energy costs, lower occupancy costs and higher net operating income (NOI) which also supports higher appraisal.

The energy benchmarking for nonresidential buildings is not just a question of compliance but more importantly a question of your competitiveness. In the tight commercial building market the improved energy performance creates a unique selling proposition. Motivators for investment in energy efficiency include cutting greenhouse gas emissions, enhancing the company’s public image and obtaining incentives offered by governments and utilities.

Energy performance reports provide an opportunity to cut out the waste in the system and help focus the attention of building owners to optimize the performance of their existing equipment and determine where to make energy-efficient upgrades.

The Next Step

An integrated approach will not only provide building owners the benchmarking necessary to comply with AB 1103 moreover it will line out the energy saving potential for the building – all of that will increase the competitiveness of the building in a tight market place!

This Energy performance benchmark allows an engineering team to tailor an energy efficiency strategy for your building based on goals, budget and time frame.

For more information visit: www.ab1103.org.