130 Merrill Avenue

How does 130 Merrill Avenue compare with other K-12 school buildings in New York City?

The latest disclosures cover 2,301 K-12 school buildings in New York City, out of 48,310 buildings citywide. 130 Merrill Avenue's ENERGY STAR score of 91 compares with an average of 64 across the 2,052 that report a score; it scores higher than 85% of them and lower than 14%. Its site EUI of 18.5 kBtu/ft² is about 70% below the average of 61.3 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 67% below the group average of 4.8 kgCO₂e/ft².

At 125,187 sq ft, it is about 24% above the average floor area of 101,338 sq ft for those buildings. It was built in 1965, 12 years later than the group's average year built (1954). 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 91 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 91 means the building performs better than about 91% of its national peers. BuildingCensus bands the score into report-card grades; 91 falls in band A — high performer (85–100). 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 New York City, 43% 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. 130 Merrill Avenue's 18.5 kBtu/ft² across 125,187 sq ft works out to about 2.3 billion Btu (679 MWh-equivalent) in 2022. Its source EUI of 51.7 kBtu/ft² also counts the energy lost generating and delivering that power, which is why it is higher. The disclosure also reports 677,403 kWh of electricity for the year.

Which law requires 130 Merrill Avenue to report its energy use?

130 Merrill Avenue reports under Local Law 84 (LL84), the legal basis of New York City's Energy and Water Data Disclosure program, which publishes each covered building's annual benchmarking results. The record shown here is the report-year 2022 disclosure (source record nyc:8649017:2022). Under Local Law 97, buildings over 25,000 sq ft face carbon caps with fines of $268 per metric ton of CO₂e over the limit, phasing in from 2024.