Permanent project revision

Building Energy Performance Standards and the benchmarking behind them

Revision 2026-08-27-claims-and-sources · effective 2026-08-27

Superseded. A later revision exists: 2026-08-27-correction-run →

unreviewed

Created the first structured Evidence Passport with 8 claims and 10 source dossiers.

sha256:800839a82ec7127977fda630c87c7f69a1f18a26d4b567adfcd6c514f47df18a

All revisions → Current entity page →

Change set

add /evidencePassport — Added claim-level evidence mapping and source dossiers.
add /revisionHistory — Established a permanent, hash-addressed baseline revision.

8: of 8 claims mapped
10: source dossiers
3: publication dates recorded
0: archives linked
0: exact locators
0: content captures hashed

Claims, one by one

The text below is copied verbatim from the published record. Each claim names the source dossiers that carry it; caveats stay attached to the claim they qualify.

Claim 1 clm-9a280a6b73c71b29 quantitative

The CleanEnergy DC Omnibus Amendment Act of 2018, effective 22 March 2019, ordered DOEE to set a minimum energy performance standard for large buildings

Published field: snippet · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: The statute page records that the act 'establishes a building energy performance standard program at the Department of Energy and Environment' and gives the effective date; the regulator's programme page describes the standard it then set.
Caveat: No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

D.C. Law 22-257, CleanEnergy DC Omnibus Amendment Act of 2018
DOEE — Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS)

Claim 2 clm-a53c0493165d49b3 descriptive

the first such standard in the United States according to DOEE itself and the Institute for Market Transformation

Published field: snippet · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: The DOEE release of November 2021 announces rules for 'the nation's first energy performance standards'; the Institute for Market Transformation's District hub describes the same first.
Caveat: A first claimed by the regulator and by an advocacy institute that runs the District's building hub, not by an outside register.

Sources carrying this claim

DOEE press release — rules for the nation's first energy performance standards (Nov 2021)
Institute for Market Transformation — District of Columbia building hub

Claim 3 clm-c76168c407a45120 quantitative

for each property type it sits at the local median ENERGY STAR score, or Source EUI where no score exists, so roughly half of every category starts below the line and gets one compliance cycle to improve, typically by cutting site energy use 20%

Published field: snippet · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: The Building Innovation Hub's explainer of the released rules sets out how the standard is expressed — the median for each property type, using Source EUI where no ENERGY STAR score exists — and what below-standard buildings must do in a compliance cycle.
Caveat: No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

Building Innovation Hub — BEPS rules released
DOEE — Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS)

Claim 4 clm-6e36fa5f67c81227 quantitative

It runs on benchmarking data the District has required and disclosed publicly since a 2008 law, now republished on the city's open data portal

Published field: snippet · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: DOEE's benchmarking page describes the requirement for large buildings to track and report energy and water use annually; the open data portal republishes per-building benchmarking and performance data as a dataset rather than a PDF list.
Caveat: No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

DOEE — Energy benchmarking
Open Data DC — Building Energy Performance dataset

Claim 5 clm-75011fc97e6d3310 quantitative

Buildings that miss their pathway target owe an alternative compliance payment of up to $10 per square foot, capped at $7.5m

Published field: snippet · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: The BEPS Guidebook's enforcement chapter: 'maximum payment for buildings at ten dollars ($10) per each square foot of gross floor area', with the stated cap.
Caveat: No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

DOEE BEPS Guidebook, Chapter 6 — Enforcement

Claim 6 clm-b55e0690bdeab70b quantitative

the first cycle only ends on 31 December 2026, reports are due in spring 2027, and nothing has been assessed yet

Published field: snippet · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: The 2024 amendment act, effective 21 March 2025, moved the benchmark reporting and verification deadline; the Building Innovation Hub's 2025 update confirms the proposed delays to the standards did not happen and the timetable stands.
Caveat: No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

D.C. Law 25-307, Building Energy Performance Standards Amendment Act of 2024
Building Innovation Hub — DC building performance regulations: no delays (2025)
DOEE — Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS)

Claim 7 clm-d4b084ca66b2e89f descriptive

A standard pegged to the median grades buildings against their peers instead of an absolute cap, so it never runs out of laggards

Published field: lesson · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: The standard is set at each property type's local median, which by construction leaves about half of every category below it at each re-setting.
Caveat: No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

Building Innovation Hub — BEPS rules released
DOEE — Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS)

Claim 8 clm-1fedeefea4243355 descriptive

the money is entirely theoretical until a cycle closes: seven years after enactment, no payment has been assessed

Published field: lesson · verbatim
Mapping: mapped · no interpretation or interpolation added by this passport
What the mapping says: The enforcement chapter sets the payment rate and cap; the 2025 status update confirms the first cycle had not yet closed and the timetable was unchanged.
Caveat: No claim-specific caveat recorded

Sources carrying this claim

DOEE BEPS Guidebook, Chapter 6 — Enforcement
Building Innovation Hub — DC building performance regulations: no delays (2025)

Source dossiers and revision state

This layer records what is known about each source, what is still missing, and the exact snapshot this page is rendering. A missing date, archive or hash stays visible as missing.

unreviewed Revision 2026-08-27-claims-and-sources effective 2026-08-27 · created 2026-08-27

Awaiting operator and domain-expert review; publication of this revision implies neither.

Erratum on this revision's envelope. The snapshot, its hash and its permanent link are untouched.

createdAt previously read 2026-08-31T13:00:00Z. The batching script that produced this revision advanced createdAt into the future to satisfy the strictly-increasing order the validator requires per entity. The value never recorded a real event; the corrected value is the moment the revision provably existed in the repository. Corrected to 2026-08-27T03:13:38Z on 2026-08-27; evidence: first appears in commit 7a13833ce6, committed 2026-08-27T03:13:38Z.

sha256:800839a82ec7127977fda630c87c7f69a1f18a26d4b567adfcd6c514f47df18a

Revision history → Permanent version link → Machine-readable record → Evidence Constitution →

8: of 8 claims mapped
10: source dossiers
3: publication dates recorded
0: archives linked
0: exact locators
0: content captures hashed

Governance facts carried by the record

Operator: Department of Energy and Environment (DOEE)
Actor types: city-government
Funding model: public
Funding description: District of Columbia government; DOEE regulates and compliance costs fall on building owners
Cost: Not recorded
Ownership: Not recorded
Decision rights: Not recorded
Exit conditions: Not recorded

10 source dossiers

DOEE — Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS) doee.dc.gov · 4 linked claims

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-9b75c359e6151d6f
Publisher: Name not classified · doee.dc.gov
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: Not recorded
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
Regulator's programme page: 'The District's Building Energy Performance Standard (BEPS) Program was set forth in Title III of the Clean Energy DC Omnibus Act of 2018.' DOEE also states it 'established the first set of Standards on January 1, 2021 that were no lower than the local median ENERGY STAR score (or the equivalent metric of Source EUI)' — the sentence the percentile mechanism rests on.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-9a280a6b73c71b29
clm-c76168c407a45120
clm-b55e0690bdeab70b
clm-d4b084ca66b2e89f

D.C. Law 22-257, CleanEnergy DC Omnibus Amendment Act of 2018 code.dccouncil.gov · 1 linked claim

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-805bc74aacf90785
Publisher: Name not classified · code.dccouncil.gov
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: Not recorded
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
Statute page: the act 'establishes a building energy performance standard program at the Department of Energy and Environment' and 'became effective on March 22, 2019' — the post-congressional-review date, not the December 2018 Council vote or the January 2019 mayoral signature.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-9a280a6b73c71b29

DOEE press release — rules for the nation's first energy performance standards (Nov 2021) doee.dc.gov · 1 linked claim

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-2762e03d50cbaf2a
Publisher: Name not classified · doee.dc.gov
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: Not recorded
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
Source of the superlative, attributed rather than asserted: the release describes the 'nation's first Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS) program' and dates the final rules to November 2021.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-a53c0493165d49b3

Institute for Market Transformation — District of Columbia building hub imt.org · 1 linked claim

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-aeccac2c403eb1c9
Publisher: Name not classified · imt.org
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: 2019-12-04
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
Independent second claimant for the superlative: DC 'became the first U.S. city to pass legislation that requires owners of a broad swath of existing buildings to improve their energy performance… The law includes a first-in-the-nation policy mechanism, the building energy performance standard (BEPS).'
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-a53c0493165d49b3

DOEE BEPS Guidebook, Chapter 6 — Enforcement dc.beam-portal.org · 2 linked claims

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-52265d59821f687d
Publisher: Name not classified · dc.beam-portal.org
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: Not recorded
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
Official guidebook on DOEE's BEPS portal: 'maximum payment for buildings at ten dollars ($10) per each square foot of gross floor area'; 'The maximum payment for a building shall be no greater than seven million five hundred thousand dollars ($7,500,000)'; the payment is assessed 'proportionally based to the building or campus' actual performance relative to its Pathway target', after the final reporting deadline of the chosen pathway.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-75011fc97e6d3310
clm-1fedeefea4243355

Building Innovation Hub — BEPS rules released buildinginnovationhub.org · 2 linked claims

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-1c69c7554d3f38c3
Publisher: Name not classified · buildinginnovationhub.org
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: 2021-11-05
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
IMT-run DC hub, on how the standard is expressed and what below-standard buildings must do: 'The Standards include performance targets based on ENERGY STAR score (for buildings that can receive a score) and Source EUI (for buildings that cannot receive an ENERGY STAR score)', with 'the performance pathway (requiring 20% site EUI reduction)' among five pathways; initial compliance period 1 January 2021 to 31 December 2026.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-c76168c407a45120
clm-d4b084ca66b2e89f

D.C. Law 25-307, Building Energy Performance Standards Amendment Act of 2024 code.dccouncil.gov · 1 linked claim

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-1b2151f13ba07ef7
Publisher: Name not classified · code.dccouncil.gov
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: Not recorded
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
Effective 21 March 2025. Moved 'the benchmark reporting and verification deadline from April 1 to May 1', cut third-party verification 'from every 3 years to every 6 years', renamed 'alternative compliance penalties' to 'alternative compliance payments', and requires standards 'no later than January 1, 2028, and every 6 years thereafter' — the source for six-year cycles and a re-set target.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-b55e0690bdeab70b

Building Innovation Hub — DC building performance regulations: no delays (2025) buildinginnovationhub.org · 2 linked claims

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-1cc1ec549472af36
Publisher: Name not classified · buildinginnovationhub.org
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: 2025-05-30
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
Currency check: 'the proposed delays to the Building Energy Performance Standards (BEPS) and Net-Zero Energy (NZE) code were removed from the final FY26 Budget Support Act approved by DC Council on July 28, 2025.' Confirms the Cycle 1 deadline of 31 December 2026 and compliance reports due April and May 2027 — hence no assessment before 2027.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-b55e0690bdeab70b
clm-1fedeefea4243355

DOEE — Energy benchmarking doee.dc.gov · 1 linked claim

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-5194cd901f50895e
Publisher: Name not classified · doee.dc.gov
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: Not recorded
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
The data layer that feeds the standard: DC's 'energy benchmarking laws require large buildings to annually track their energy and water efficiency and report the results to DOEE for public disclosure', with 'all private buildings >10,000 sq ft' now reporting by May 1. Public disclosure is mandated by the Clean and Affordable Energy Act of 2008; DOEE published the first disclosed set on 24 February 2014.
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-6e36fa5f67c81227

Open Data DC — Building Energy Performance dataset opendata.dc.gov · 1 linked claim

Open original source ↗

Stable source ID: src-fd39a7376a225670
Publisher: Name not classified · opendata.dc.gov
Type / language: web-page · language not classified
Published: Not recorded
Updated: Not recorded
Source last checked: No source-level check date
Record last verified: 2026-08-27
Dossier created: 2026-08-31
Retrieved copy: No local capture recorded
Archive: No archived copy linked
Content hash: No captured content hash
Locator: Open the recorded source note
The disclosure is genuinely open data, not a PDF list: DOEE republishes per-building benchmarking and BEPS performance on the District's open data portal (mirrored in the federal catalog as 'District of Columbia — Building Energy Benchmarking').
Descriptive only — not page/paragraph exact
Claims linked: clm-6e36fa5f67c81227

Known limits of this passport

Publisher names and source languages have not yet been classified; domains are recorded without guessing.
Existing source notes are descriptive locators, not page- or paragraph-exact citations.
A missing archive, publication date or content hash is shown as null rather than inferred.
The project-level evidence grade ranks the strongest source in the entry; it is not a truth score for every claim.