The New Buildings Institute study was confirmed by performed by the National Research Council Canada–Institute for Research in Construction.

The New Buildings Institute study was correct to flag the lab buildings energy usage. The Labs 21 benchmark tool has a database of 170 buildings and a quick use of the tool will show that the mean (average energy use in all climates is around 550 kBtu/ft2).

The modeled and actual used energy delta in the LEED buildings in the NBI study was less than 8%, not bad for not including plug loads.

I would recommend the following reading: Lessons Learned from Field Evaluation of Six High-Performance Buildings, Moving Toward Transparency and Disclosure in the Energy Performance of Green Buildings, Evaluating the Site Energy Performance of the First Generation of LEED-Certified Commercial Buildings for starters.

Gifford was right about one thing, no LEED building should have all of the lights on at 3 am with no one but security in the building. But that isn’t the USGBC’s fault, it’s the owners!

As an appraiser with 20+ years’ esperience in valuing commercial and residential buildings (including analyzing operating statements), I understand the difficulty of comparing seemingly similar properterties that nonetheless have very different operating profiles – whether due to cocupancy, use, age, design, size, geography, orientation, etc. I agree with Mr. Spielvogel that profeesional judgement and experience is key to effective and accurate use of any type of operating data. But impeaching the data because of its potential limitations would be unwise. Collecting more data won’t in and of itself make buildings more efficient. But without the data, those of us with professional judgement and experience will have little to work with.