Nichols Elementary School

How does Nichols Elementary School compare with other K-12 school buildings in California?

The latest disclosures cover 2,128 K-12 school buildings in California, out of 40,029 buildings citywide. Nichols Elementary School's ENERGY STAR score of 82 compares with an average of 74 across the 2,016 that report a score; it scores higher than 52% of them and lower than 46%. Its site EUI of 24.0 kBtu/ft² is about 31% below the average of 34.6 kBtu/ft² — it uses less energy per square foot than the typical building in that group. Its emissions intensity of 1.6 kgCO₂e/ft² is about 22% below the group average of 2.0 kgCO₂e/ft².

At 51,638 sq ft, it is about 60% below the average floor area of 129,123 sq ft for those buildings. It was built in 2002, 26 years later than the group's average year built (1976). Across all 24 jurisdictions BuildingCensus covers, the 6,548 K-12 school buildings average an ENERGY STAR score of 64 and a site EUI of 52.7 kBtu/ft².

What does an ENERGY STAR score of 82 mean?

ENERGY STAR scores run from 1 to 100 and are computed by the EPA's Portfolio Manager as a percentile against similar buildings nationwide, adjusted for climate, size and use: a score of 82 means the building performs better than about 82% of its national peers. BuildingCensus bands the score into report-card grades; 82 falls in band B — above median (70–84). Scores of 75 or higher meet the threshold for ENERGY STAR certification; certification itself is a separate, verified application that the disclosure does not record. In California, 65% of scored buildings are at 75 or above.

Site energy-use intensity (EUI) is the energy a building uses on site in a year divided by its floor area, in thousand Btu per square foot — lower is more efficient. Nichols Elementary School's 24.0 kBtu/ft² across 51,638 sq ft works out to about 1.2 billion Btu (363 MWh-equivalent) in 2024. The disclosure also reports 280,070 kWh of electricity and 3,173 therms of natural gas for the year.

Which law requires Nichols Elementary School to report its energy use?

Nichols Elementary School reports under AB 802 (Public Resources Code §25402.10), the legal basis of California's Building Energy Benchmarking Program (statewide), which publishes each covered building's annual benchmarking results. The record shown here is the report-year 2024 disclosure (source record california:38381992:2024). AB 802 requires every California commercial building over 50,000 sq ft to report energy use to the CEC annually; the CEC publicly discloses the results statewide.