Building Performance Standards

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What We're Doing

The City of Columbus is considering strategies that improve health and energy efficiency in existing buildings, including implementing and providing technical support for Building Performance Standards (BPS). Since 52% of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions are attributed to existing buildings, developing policies and programs to reduce these emissions and achieve Columbus’ Climate Action Plan goals is imperative. This requires engaging stakeholders and eliciting meaningful feedback from the community. Below, you'll find more information, including ways to get involved.  

With support from the US Department of Energy, the City of Columbus is working with organizations and other cities across Ohio to gather feedback from stakeholders; conduct a stakeholder engagement plan that is as open and transparent as possible; understand local opinions and concerns; identify opportunities to address Columbus’ goals; and incorporate community values into a Building Performance Standard policy.  

Why It's Important

In 2020 the city passed the Energy and Water Benchmarking and Transparency Ordinance which required all buildings 50,000 square feet and above to report their energy and water usage to the city. Through increased awareness and reliability of energy data we saw energy decrease by 2.97% for buildings in compliance.  

A Building Performance Standard is the next phase of this process. This policy uses benchmarking data to set specific targets intended to reduce energy use in existing public and private buildings over a certain size to achieve a standard of performance. By implementing a Building Performance Standard Columbus can expect to see a 46% energy savings for included buildings by 2050. The goal is to create new jobs and savings on energy bills while improving the health and resilience of our community.   

What Comes Next

We are currently about to kickoff our advisory group which will meet from July – November. This group is comprised of a broad range of building industry organizations from the public, private, non-profit, and academic sectors that represent a diversity of perspectives and expertise. 

We will be launching our official public engagement in the beginning of 2026, but if you have any questions or thoughts in the meantime you can reach out to Cassie Johnson, CJJohnson@columbus.gov or Eric Porr, ETPorr@columbus.gov.  

  • Healthy Buildings Advisory Group Meeting #1: Setting the Context, July 31, 2025 

Ordinance Development Process

  1. Establish and meet with a Healthy Buildings Advisory Group.
  2. Host public meetings, including focus groups with representatives from impacted buildings, to collect feedback on policy design.
  3. Compile feedback and create draft policy language.
  4. Share draft policy with the public for feedback.
  5. Summarize feedback and finalize policy language.
  6. Pass legislation adopting the policy.  

Resources

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