Save Energy, Save Money with ENERGY STAR for Buildings

Through ENERGY STAR, EPA offers a wide range of resources to help you take control of the energy performance of your buildings. Did you know that, on average, 30 percent of the energy used to run government buildings and K-12 schools goes to waste? With rising energy costs and tightening budgets, it's more important than ever to improve the efficiency of your buildings. Get started saving energy and money for your organization by following the steps below

Join as a Partner

Demonstrate your commitment to managing fiscal and environmental resources responsibly by joining as an ENERGY STAR partner. EPA’s ENERGY STAR partnership offers a proven energy management strategy that helps you measure current energy performance, set goals, track savings, and get recognition for improvements. Becoming an ENERGY STAR partner is easy, and there is no cost to partner with ENERGY STAR or use ENERGY STAR promotional materials.

Benchmark Your Energy Performance

The first step to improving energy performance is determining your current baseline. After all, you can't manage what you don't measure. Use EPA’s ENERGY STAR measurement and tracking tool, Portfolio Manager, to benchmark the energy and water performance of your buildings. Portfolio Manager is an interactive energy management tool that enables you to track and assess energy and water consumption across an entire portfolio of buildings in a secure online environment. Portfolio Manager can help you set investment priorities, identify under-performing buildings to target for upgrades, and track the results of efficiency efforts.

The following resources will help you start benchmarking the performance of your buildings:

• Utilize the Benchmarking Starter Kit to evaluate your energy performance, water efficiency, and carbon emissions.
• Use the ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager Data Collection Worksheet to identify and gather all the data you'll need to benchmark your building.
• Print the Portfolio Manager Quick Reference Guide, a handy, at-a-glance guide to the basic steps of using Portfolio Manager.

Share Energy Performance Data with the VEPGA Master Account
Once your building has been benchmarked using Portfolio Manager, sharing your performance information with the VEPGA Master Account is easy. A master account is a designated Portfolio Manager account with which multiple Portfolio Manager users can share building and energy use information. Sharing with the VEPGA Master Account enables you to compare the energy use of your buildings with other VEPGA members across the state through a shared platform that standardizes results. 

Portfolio Manager enables you to view and compare percent improvement from a set baseline, weather-normalized source energy, and energy and water costs.  These overall comparisons will allow for better performance as you will be able to identify your targets for energy efficiency against top performing buildings in the state managed by other VEPGA members and share strategies and best practices for improved management practices.

• To share, follow these step-by-step instructions on how to share with the VEPGA - VEPGAMASTER. 
• View VEPGA member performance through the VEPGA Master Account.  Contact VEPGA MASTER ACCOUNT POINT CONTACT  for login information.

Additional Resources

• Through ENERGY STAR, EPA offers free online training to help improve the energy performance of your organization. Live and pre-recorded training webinars are available on benchmarking, building-specific topics, and overall energy management strategies.
• Visit the ENERGY STAR for Government homepage and associated pages to find tools and best practices supporting the Recovery Act, learn about local governments using Portfolio Manager to launch exciting efficiency competitions, and read a fact sheet to learn more about leveraging EPA’s Portfolio Manager.

• Make smart investments with the Cash Flow Opportunity (CFO) Calculator, an interactive calculator that helps helps decision-makers quantify the cost of delaying investment in upgrades.

• Plan strategic upgrades using the ENERGY STAR Building Upgrade Manual. The Building Upgrade Manual recommended upgrade process follows a five-stage approach and emphasizes continuous improvement.