According to House Bill 19-1261 Climate Action Plan to Reduce Pollution, Colorado shall have statewide goals to reduce 2025 greenhouse gas emissions by at least 26%, 2030 greenhouse gas emissions by at least 50%, and 2050 greenhouse gas emissions by at least 90% of the levels of statewide greenhouse gas emissions that existed in 2005.
The “Energy Performance for Buildings” Statute (House Bill 21-1286) passed the Colorado General Assembly on June 8, 2021 and went into effect on September 6, 2021. This law requires owners of large commercial, multifamily, and public buildings 50,000 square feet or more to annually benchmark their whole-building energy use to the Colorado Energy Office (CEO).
On or before December 1, 2022 and on or before June 1 of each following year, the owner of a covered building is required to submit a report that includes a full 12-months of whole-building energy usage (electric, natural gas, district steam, district hot and chilled water, solar, wind, etc.) for the previous year.
If a building is benchmarked within the City of Denver, the City will pass along the submitted benchmarking report, but the building owner must go to www.buildingperformanceco.com to pay the $100 annual filing fee to be considered compliant at the state level.
House Bill 21-1286, the ‘Energy Performance for Buildings’ statute, directed the Colorado Energy Office to convene a Task Force to develop Building Performance Standards (BPS) to meet sector-wide greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction targets of 7% by 2026 and 20% by 2030. The BPS recommendations, which must be approved by two-thirds of the Task Force members, will be reviewed and decided on by the Air Quality Control Commission (AQCC) in 2023.
*Click here to view the latest presentation for the State’s Building Performance Task Force, providing their draft recommendations.
Colorado legislature has passed House Bill 22-1362 Building Greenhouse Gas Emissions. Once signed, the bill will require local governments and certain state agencies to adopt and enforce codes that are consistent with two of the model codes, encouraging local governments and certain state agencies to 3 sets of model code language:
The bill will also create:
*Click here to view a description of next steps for HB 22-1362 committee from state lobby.
Click here for details on the statewide program aimed at increasing energy efficiency and decreasing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the building sector.
Click on any of the images below to learn more about sustainability policies for specific local and state agencies in our Rocky Mountain and Midwest regions. Each section describes sustainability goals, action plans, and resources offered in these locations.
