Implications of Ownership in the U.S. and U.K.: An Exploration of ENERGY STAR® Buildings & the Energy Efficiency Accreditation Scheme

Panel: Human and Social Dimensions of Energy Use: Trends and their Implications

Author:
Kathryn Janda, Environmental Change Institute, Oxford University

Abstract

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ENERGY STAR benchmarking tool has been used to put building energy performance in a national context since 1999. Beyond energy performance, little is known about the groups of people who own and manage these buildings, and whether they are planning to upgrade additional space (or develop new space) to meet this performance standard. Previous work (Janda & Brodsky 2000) described the range of firms and institutions involved in owning and managing the very first 90 ENERGY STAR labeled office buildings. This paper: (1) revisits and builds upon the initial work, and (2) creates a comparative context by including information about organizations participating in the U.K. Carbon Trust's Energy Efficiency Accreditation Scheme (EEAS). Both ENERGY STAR and EEAS recognize buildings and organizations of many different types (e.g., offices, banks, universities, schools, and hospitals). This paper explores organizational contexts that favor the adoption of energyefficient technologies and practices by identifying and comparing participants in these programs, with a particular focus on firms and organizations in the office sector. The results provide insights about the pathways that different types of organizations represent in transforming the market for energy-efficient technologies and practices in the U.S. and the U.K. Future energy efficiency efforts could take advantage of these findings in program design and evaluation as a means to target firms that are likely to adopt energy-efficient technologies and practices. On a broader level, these findings may lead to an understanding of the role that such firms could play in changing the international market for low-carbon commercial buildings.