Boston BERDO Emissions Reporting Deadline Extended to August 15; Owners Should Act Early to Avoid Compliance Risks
The Boston Building Emissions Reduction and Disclosure Ordinance (BERDO) has extended the annual reporting deadline by three months to August 15, but compliance requirements remain unchanged. Covered buildings must submit verified energy and water data, with late submissions subject to fines of $150 to $300 per day. Experts advise owners to act early and utilize flexibility measures and city resources to achieve compliance.
Editor's Note:Erin Camp is the Director of Energy Sustainability Programs at PowerOptions, an energy consortium serving nonprofits and public institutions in New England and a qualified third-party verifier for BERDO reporting and compliance. The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author.
Although Boston has extended the filing deadline for its Building Emissions Reduction and Disclosure Ordinance (BERDO) by three months to August 15, building owners and operators who have not yet completed their submissions and third-party verification should still act immediately.
The new filing deadline provides additional buffer time, but the underlying compliance requirements remain unchanged. Covered buildings must submit verified and compliance-assessed annual building energy and water data.
Building operators who miss the deadline will face penalties and may accumulate costly sustainability retrofits—at a time when supplementary legislation aimed at improving building performance is advancing.
Emission Reduction Requirements
BERDO requires large buildings to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The ordinance applies to residential buildings with 15 or more units, non-residential buildings of 20,000 square feet or more, and any property portfolio totaling 20,000 square feet or more, or totaling 15 or more units.
Operators of these buildings must report annual energy and water consumption and meet emission limits that will become increasingly stringent over time. The goal is to achieve net-zero emissions from buildings by 2050.
Before the new deadline, building operators must submit total building energy and water data for the previous calendar year, verified by a qualified third-party professional. Building performance data will be made available to the public.
Missing the submission deadline may result in daily fines: $150 per day for smaller buildings (20,000 to 34,999 square feet, or 15 to 34 units) and $300 per day for larger buildings (35,000 square feet or more, or 35 units or more).
Submission and Verification Process
For building operators, the first step is to collect water consumption and energy usage data for each building type. Data can come from utility bills or by aggregating building energy meter data. Boston's utility companies, including Eversource, National Grid, and Vicinity Energy, can provide energy meter data in Excel format.
Building operators must submit this information, along with key characteristics of each building, to the federal government'sENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager(ESPM). Once data is in the ESPM account, it can be automatically imported into the operator's account with the city.
Building operators must also complete the BERDO reporting form and submit it through the city'sreporting portal, which collects data beyond the ESPM submission.
Third-party verification must be completed by aqualified verifier. The verifier must submit verification results to the city by the August 15 deadline. After the first year of reporting, third-party verification is required every five years.
For larger buildings, August 15 is both the first emissions compliance deadline and the first data reporting deadline. Operators of these buildings must not only submit verified energy data, but their buildings' energy-based carbon emissions must also be below thresholds set by building type.
Compliance Tools
After uploading data, building operators can use the city'sBERDO Emissions Calculatorto view building emission projections and plan emission reduction steps. This tool is best suited for individual buildings, not building portfolios.
The city also offers free data reporting and verification services for self-managed residential building owners, small nonprofit owners, and commercial building owners with small business tenants. This funding is limited, and owners mustsubmit an application。
Other resources provided by the city include theBuilding Decarbonization Plan—where energy experts develop a "zero-emission gradual" plan for owners to save energy, upgrade systems, and utilize renewable energy; and theEquitable Emissions Investment Fund—which provides annual grants to help owners pay for decarbonization projects. Applications for this year's funding have closed.
Flexibility Solutions
Undoubtedly, BERDO can be overwhelming. Some owners have limited knowledge of their buildings' energy consumption and may already face maintenance backlogs. The program also requires owners to balance capital planning with potential compliance retrofits or fines.
To ease the burden, the program includes several measures that allow eligible owners to adjust their emission limits and/or reduction timelines.
There are four flexibility measures:
- Mixed Emission Standards: Applicable to buildings with multiple primary uses, may allow for higher emission limits.
- Building Portfolio Measure: Establishing portfolio-level emission standards—rather than building-by-building accounting—may allow for longer reduction timelines.
- Individual Compliance Schedule: Using historical emission data to develop customized reduction timelines and potentially adjust emission obligations based on building operations.
- Hardship Compliance Plan: Providing alternative reduction timelines and/or flexible reduction targets for buildings demonstrating technical or financial hardship.
Application deadlines for each flexibility measure vary. Relevantmeasure detailscan be found online.
Energy management organizations are another resource. They can assist with energy consumption analysis, ensure data is accurate and properly verified, predict fine amounts, and estimate when buildings will exceed compliance.
Planning Ahead
Although BERDO may pose challenges for building owners, for property owners not subject to the law, this is also an opportunity to explore their own emission reporting. They can replace building equipment, adopt "greener" energy sources such as solar panels and heat pumps, and begin advancing decarbonization.
BERDO is not a simple checklist; it is a catalyst driving building owners to make thoughtful choices about their properties and the environment.