building Performance standards
6/12/25 @ 1:00PM
Bienville Room
The Basics
What does This mean?
A building performance standard (BPS) is a policy that sets specific deadlines for existing public and private buildings over a certain size to achieve quantified standards of performance across one or more metrics—such as energy use, water use, and/or greenhouse gas emissions. The standards become more ambitious over time, driving continuous, long-term improvement in the building stock.
The standards are applied to the entire building versus one individual element.
Why Does This Matter?
Buildings use half of all energy, 75% of all electricity, and account for the majority of carbon emissions in cities.
BPS can offer pathways to build resilience by improving carbon emissions, public health, and offer economic opportunity. With a BPS, a building can protect against heatwaves, storms, outages, and air pollution.
How can this advance equitable building decarbonization?
Building performance is more than just energy efficiency. It's about creating higher performing, lower emitting, and healthier buildings for all…
These standards can be tailored to the local needs and conditions of a particular jurisdiction and informed by the data gathered from the region.
The standards can provide more than one way to meet compliance, offering flexibility to building owners.
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