Boston is the most energy-efficient U.S. city for the second time, according to
the third edition of the City Energy Efficiency
Scorecard by the American Council for an
Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE). The
Massachusetts capital received 84.5 out of
a possible 100 points, improving 2.5 points
over its last score in 2015.
However, the scorecard also contained a
few surprises. Los Angeles jumped 25 points
from 2015, entering the top 5 (and top 10)
for the first time. San Diego, Kansas City and
Phoenix nabbed the second, third and fourth
most improved spots, and 7 other cities
showed double-digit improvements since the
last scorecard was issued.
Other findings include:
Boston Tops Energy
Efficiency Scorecard
HOW CITIES ARE STEPPING UP EFFORTS TO
LOWER ENERGY CONSUMPTION
n Phoenix gained 13 points to qualify as the
fourth most-improved city. Its improved
score in the community initiatives category was due to its adoption of the 2050
Environmental Sustainability initiative,
which included both energy savings and
climate goals.
n Orlando was one of 11 cities that improved
by at least 10 points. It accomplished that
by emphasizing existing building energy
efficiency through benchmarking energy
use and making building energy data
transparent and accessible. The other cit-
ies with double digit improvements are
Austin, Philadelphia, Denver, Pittsburgh,
Raleigh, Portland, OR, and the four most-
improved cities.
n Los Angeles launched a new Existing
Building Energy and Water Efficiency
program for commercial and multifamily
buildings. It requires an energy audit, ret-
rofits and benchmarking, as well as water
efficiency measures.
n San Diego passed a Climate Action Plan
that tackled both commercial and resi-
dential energy use. It established the city’s
goals to reduce energy consumption by
15% in certain homes and to reduce com-
munity-wide greenhouse gas emissions by
15% by 2020.
The scorecard covers five key areas: local
government operations, community-wide
initiatives, building policies, energy and water
utilities, and transportation policies. Learn
more about the scorecard at www.aceee.org.
Top 10 Most Energy-Efficient Cities
1) Boston
2) New York City
3) Seattle
4) Los Angeles
4) Portland, OR
6) Austin
7) Chicago
8) Washington, D. C.
9) Denver
9) San Francisco
As part of MIT’s 2015 Plan for Action on Climate Change, MIT’s new central data
dashboard, Energize_MIT, provides details
about energy use and carbon emissions on
campus. While the website currently in its
beta form will be accessible to students,
faculty and staff, its impact on research and
building modeling could provide critical
energy use data in the future for FMs.
Energize_MIT will include two types of
information: graphic representations of data
and highly detailed datasets. The interactive
graphic visualizations will represent data on
a campus-wide or building-by-building basis
for electricity, natural gas, fuel oil, steam
and chilled water, as well as greenhouse gas
emissions. The datasets can be downloaded
and examine the finer details of energy use,
such as energy consumption measurements
in 15-minute intervals.
“Energize_MIT is an invaluable tool not
MIT Shares Energy Data with New Website
ENERGY DASHBOARD WILL PROVIDE ACCESS TO CAMPUS BUILDING DATA
just for helping us to better understand
and manage campus energy use, but also
for engaging the MIT community in finding
ways to reduce our energy consumption
and greenhouse gas emissions,” says Maria
T. Zuber, Vice President for Research at MIT.
“This is an important part of MIT’s climate
action plan. I am grateful to the members of
the Energize_MIT team for their hard work in
bringing this platform online.”
The hope is for faculty and students to
analyze and model energy use for the build-
ings on campus with this data. From there,
building-specific findings could help impact
similar facilities looking to improve energy
efficiency.
“The new data hub is an excellent initiative
that will empower groups from across MIT to
better understand how our campus operates
and to propose a plethora of interventions
to make our lives more comfortable and productive, as well as to enhance our buildings’
resource efficiency,” says Christoph Reinhart,
Associate Professor of Architecture.
The website will later include not only
the MIT campus, but also MIT-leased buildings and a solar plant in North Carolina built
through an MIT-led power purchase agreement. Energize_MIT is just one part in a
larger plan to provide sustainability resources
and information that will be expanded later
this year.
MIT'S ENERGY DASHBOARD shares information about energy use across campus, providing data for research and operations.
AC
E
E
E
