California Commercial Building Owners Must Disclose Energy Usage of the Building During Sale, Lease or Financing after September 1, 2013

Beginning, September 1, 2013, all California commercial buildings with a total gross floor area of more than 50,000 square feet are required to disclose the building's energy usage in advance of any sale, lease, or financing of the entire building. In order to ensure compliance with Assembly Bill 1103, owners of nonresidential buildings should: 

• Register for an account with "Portfolio Manager," the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's ENERGY STAR program online tool for managing building energy use data; 
• Create a profile within Portfolio Manager for the nonresidential building; 
• Use Portfolio Manager to request that utilities serving the building release the last 12 months of energy use data for the building to Portfolio Manager; 
• After the utility data has been provided, download the Disclosure Data; and 
• Provide the Disclosure Data as part of the sale, lease, or financing.

Owners should also consider updating purchase agreements, lease forms, and financing documents to include an express acknowledgement by the buyer, tenant, or borrower, as applicable, of receipt of the Disclosure Data.