Madison Completes the Second Year of the Building Energy Savings Program
For Immediate Release
December 1, 2025
The City of Madison has completed the second year of the Building Energy Savings Program (BESP), with 330 buildings successfully benchmarking their energy use. Benchmarking provides Madison building owners and managers with insights into their energy use and helps them identify opportunities to save energy and money. City staff are proud to announce that 85% of required commercial buildings are in compliance with the program, aligning with leading peer cities. More than one quarter of participating buildings reported energy use that puts them among their top performing peer buildings nationwide.
Adopted unanimously by the Common Council in 2023, BESP requires large commercial buildings to benchmark their energy use annually and complete building tune-ups every four years. The program is being phased in between 2024 and 2027, with commercial buildings over 50,000 square feet already participating. Next year, the final cohort of commercial buildings, those larger than 25,000 square feet, will join the program. Staff anticipate that the number of participating buildings will approximately double in 2027.
Buildings are responsible for 65% of Madison’s greenhouse gas emissions, and the Building Energy Savings Program is part of the City’s broader strategy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from all sectors. Improving energy efficiency of buildings participating in BESP by 10 to 15% could cut climate pollution by an estimated 91,257 to 136,886 tons per year. That’s like taking 17,838 to 26,757 cars off the road.
“The Building Energy Savings Program is an example of how Madison building owners and the City of Madison are working together on climate action” said Mayor Rhodes-Conway. “This collaboration will lower energy costs, cut carbon pollution, and help us achieve our goal of reaching net zero carbon emissions community-wide by 2050.”
The City’s Sustainability and Resilience Program administers Building Energy Savings Program and provides trainings, technical support, and a Help Desk for building owners. In addition, the City has been coordinating with local utilities to simplify the benchmarking process. Madison Gas and Electric’s new MyMeter tool enables their commercial customers to automate transfer of building energy data transfer to ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager (ESPM) to smooth the process of benchmarking.
“We are excited to work with Madison building owners to unlock opportunities to save energy and money,” said Dr. Jessica Price, Sustainability and Resilience Manager. “And we’re grateful to the MGE team for their work to make it easier for commercial customers to access and upload building energy data.”
As part of this program, each participating building receives a customized report with performance overviews and recommendations for improvements that can save money and lower carbon emissions. Each scorecard includes anonymized data so that building owners can see how their building compares to similar buildings in the community. For example, owners of office buildings can view how their total electricity use, heating, and greenhouse gas emissions compare to other office buildings in Madison. Each scorecard also provides tailored recommendations to reduce heating, cooling, and electrical use, along with estimates of potential annual cost savings.
“Business owners can use benchmarking to make smart decisions about where to invest in their portfolios to gain the biggest energy and cost savings,” said Alder Tag Evers, one of the policymakers that championed the development of the program. “An investment in building energy efficiency is an investment in clean air and a healthy climate for Madison.”
In addition, 27 buildings voluntarily completed early bird tune-ups. These tune-ups require building owners to check and adjust building systems, such as lighting and HVAC controls, to ensure systems are running efficiently without wasting energy or money. These early submissions demonstrate a strong commitment from owners to making sure building systems are working as intended, regardless of requirements. Next year, all commercial buildings larger than 100,000 square feet must complete their first tune-up by October 31, 2026.
