W Hotel Union Square

How does W Hotel Union Square compare with other hotel buildings in New York City?

The latest disclosures cover 970 hotel buildings in New York City, out of 48,310 buildings citywide. W Hotel Union Square's ENERGY STAR score of 61 compares with an average of 50 across the 853 that report a score; it scores higher than 62% of them and lower than 37%. Its site EUI of 81.7 kBtu/ft² is about 13% below the average of 94.3 kBtu/ft² — it uses less energy per square foot than the typical building in that group. Its emissions intensity of 7.5 kgCO₂e/ft² is roughly in line with the group average of 7.8 kgCO₂e/ft².

At 200,000 sq ft, it is about 46% above the average floor area of 137,256 sq ft for those buildings. It was built in 1911, 64 years earlier than the group's average year built (1975). Across all 24 jurisdictions BuildingCensus covers, the 3,812 hotel buildings average an ENERGY STAR score of 65 and a site EUI of 77.8 kBtu/ft².

What does an ENERGY STAR score of 61 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 61 means the building performs better than about 61% of its national peers. BuildingCensus bands the score into report-card grades; 61 falls in band C — below median (55–69). It sits 14 points below 75, the threshold for ENERGY STAR certification. 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. W Hotel Union Square's 81.7 kBtu/ft² across 200,000 sq ft works out to about 16.3 billion Btu (4,789 MWh-equivalent) in 2024. Its source EUI of 165.4 kBtu/ft² also counts the energy lost generating and delivering that power, which is why it is higher. The disclosure also reports 2,461,934 kWh of electricity, 0 therms of natural gas and 6,906 thousand gallons of water for the year.

Which law requires W Hotel Union Square to report its energy use?

W Hotel Union Square 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:36475388:2024). 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.