42 West 38th Street

How does 42 West 38th Street compare with other office buildings in New York City?

The latest disclosures cover 3,384 office buildings in New York City, out of 48,310 buildings citywide. 42 West 38th Street's ENERGY STAR score of 79 compares with an average of 72 across the 2,519 that report a score; it scores higher than 50% of them and lower than 48%. Its site EUI of 79.8 kBtu/ft² is about 24% above the average of 64.5 kBtu/ft² — it uses more energy per square foot than the typical building in that group. Its emissions intensity of 6.8 kgCO₂e/ft² is about 18% above the group average of 5.8 kgCO₂e/ft².

At 66,577 sq ft, it is about 68% below the average floor area of 205,440 sq ft for those buildings. It was built in 1989, 49 years later than the group's average year built (1940). Across all 24 jurisdictions BuildingCensus covers, the 15,264 office buildings average an ENERGY STAR score of 73 and a site EUI of 59.3 kBtu/ft².

What does an ENERGY STAR score of 79 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 79 means the building performs better than about 79% of its national peers. BuildingCensus bands the score into report-card grades; 79 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 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. 42 West 38th Street's 79.8 kBtu/ft² across 66,577 sq ft works out to about 5.3 billion Btu (1,557 MWh-equivalent) in 2024. Its source EUI of 134.7 kBtu/ft² also counts the energy lost generating and delivering that power, which is why it is higher. The disclosure also reports 582,229 kWh of electricity and 11,391 therms of natural gas for the year.

Which law requires 42 West 38th Street to report its energy use?

42 West 38th Street 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 2024 disclosure (source record nyc:62221792:2024). 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.