For most institutions, energy consumption is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions, which cause global climate change. Global climate change is having myriad negative impacts throughout the world, including increased frequency and potency of extreme weather events, sea level rise, species extinction, water shortages, declining agricultural production, ocean acidification, and spread of diseases. The impacts are particularly pronounced for vulnerable and poor communities and countries. In addition to causing global climate change, energy generation from fossil fuels, especially coal, produces air pollutants such as sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, mercury, dioxins, arsenic, cadmium and lead. These pollutants contribute to acid rain as well as health problems such as heart and respiratory diseases and cancer. Coal mining and oil and gas drilling can also damage environmentally and/or culturally significant ecosystems. Nuclear power creates highly toxic and long-lasting radioactive waste. Large-scale hydropower projects flood habitats and disrupt fish migration and can involve the relocation of entire communities.
Implementing conservation measures and switching to renewable sources of energy can help institutions save money and protect them from utility rate volatility. Renewable energy may be generated locally and allow campuses to support local economic development. Furthermore, institutions can help shape markets by creating demand for cleaner, renewable sources of energy.
This metric is looking for the total amount of energy consumed by the institution during the performance year:
For WikiRate researchers:
Institutions who report to the STARS program are listed on the STARS Participants & Reports website.
Use the institution Index, CTRL F, or Command F to search for the institution you want to research
By clicking on the hyperlinked name of the institution, you will be redirected to the page where all their STARS reports are listed. You can select either the most recent report, or one of the older reports to start tracking their performance over time.
NB: While the values in the reports might apply to different points in time (performance year, baseline year, most recent, etc.), the submission date of the report should be listed as the “year” on WikiRate. This is to ensure that reports of the same submission year can be compared. Any time specific information for the individual values should be included in the comment to that specific metric value.
To narrow down your search, navigate the reports’ index using the Reporting Category - Operations - and Credit Category - Energy - to finally select the Credit Title: Clean and Renewable Energy.
You should now be on the report page that discloses the total amount of energy consumed by the institution during the performance year. To locate the exact value you can search the page using CTRL F or Command F with keywords like energy consumed and performance year.
Always check the metric question and methodology for the unit of measure or currency - researchers may need to carry out calculations or conversions before entering the final metric value
Add comments to include details of simple or complex calculations or conversions made to determine the metric value and document any relevant contextual information, like:
the start and end date of the performance year
Further guidance on how to research values is available here, including detailed guidance on adding, editing and checking metric values.
STARS compliance guidance for institutions:
Timeframe
Institutions should report the most recent data available from within the three years prior to the anticipated date of submission. Institutions may choose the annual start and end dates that work best with the data they have (e.g., fiscal or calendar year), as long as data are reported from a consecutive 12-month period.
Sampling and Data Standards
Report all on-site, stationary energy that was consumed by the institution (as the institution is defined in the overall STARS institutional boundary). Transportation fuels are excluded. Reporting on a sample or subset of energy generation and consumption is not allowed for this credit.
All reported energy figures should be based on site energy (the amount of energy consumed on campus) rather than source energy (the amount of energy consumed on campus plus the energy used off-site to generate and transport the energy to the institution).
Institutions that convert fuel on-site (e.g., on-campus cogeneration facilities and boilers) should report only the amount of fuel purchased/converted toward the total energy consumption figure, not the resulting heat, steam, hot/chilled water or electricity.
To aggregate energy consumption data from multiple sources, figures should be converted into MMBtu (one million British thermal units—a standard measure of energy) using the following equivalents:
---- insert conversion table ----
A unit conversion tool that includes more detailed conversion factors (e.g., for liquid fuels) is available in the online STARS Reporting Tool (.xls).