In a recent blog post, I discussed the Maryland Building Energy Performance Standards that have been established through regulations of the Maryland Department of the Environment (“the MDE”). The MDE regulations require annual “benchmark reporting” by the owners of buildings to which the program is applicable. Under this program, building owners are required to report whole building energy consumption data for the previous calendar year. Energy use information for 2024 must be submitted to the MDE by September 1, 2025. As reported in the prior blog post, among the buildings that are required to submit energy use information to the MDE are “one or more buildings held in the condominium form of ownership with a combined gross floor area of 35,000 square feet or more, excluding the parking garage area, and governed by a single board of managers.” In other words, for purposes of determining if a condominium meets the 35,000 square foot threshold, all buildings in the condominium were to be combined in the aggregate. However, yesterday, the MDE issued a compliance advisory that changes this. The advisory provides as follows: “An individual building held in the condominium form of ownership with gross floor area less than 35,000 ft, excluding the parking garage area, is not required to submit a benchmarking report. Gross floor area is defined by the area between the principal exterior surfaces of the enclosing fixed walls of the building.” The effect of this is that condominiums may now calculate their square footage on a per building basis rather than combining the square footage of all buildings in the condominium. Essentially, an individual condominium building that is less than 35,000 is not covered by the reporting requirements, regardless of the size of other buildings in the complex.
Of course, any condominium building containing 35,000 square feet of more of gross floor area, excluding a parking garage, still must report is energy usage for 2024 by September 1, 2025. Please see my prior blog post for details on the reporting program.
