As part of Denver's plan to reduce energy consumption in buildings, the city established a program that required owners of large buildings to benchmark and report energy performance in order to raise awareness and drive action. To support, the city provided tools for benchmarking and resources to improve energy efficiency.

Under the city's current 80x50 Climate Action Plan, Denver has set targets to reduce energy consumption in commercial buildings 10% by 2020, 30% by 2030, and 50% by 2050, and reduce heating emissions 50% by 2040. Low market awareness has so far been a barrier, with the city lacking in energy efficiency resources.

In 2016 Denver City Council passed the Energize Denver Benchmarking Ordinance which required all building owners and managers of buildings 25,000 square feet or larger to annually assess and report their building's energy performance. The city provided an interactive resource manager tool, called ENERGY STAR Portfolio manager, to support building managers in benchmarking, and also offered training sessions on the benchmarking process. The building energy performance data were published annually on an online platform (https://energizedenver.org), helping the market to better value energy efficiency.

In the first three years of the ordinance (2017 - 2019), Denver achieved a 90% compliance rate. Benchmarked buildings over 50,000 square feet saw 0.8% energy savings since 2016, while buildings between 25,000 and 50,000 square feet showed 1.25% energy savings. On average, benchmarked buildings saw a 0.4% decrease in energy use annually since 2016.

Photo by Robert W. on Flickr.