Hey friends,

Greetings from NYC!

I'll be doing some sightseeing while I'm here and one of the sights I was most looking forward to was... you guessed it... buildings.

I'm the guy on the street staring straight up and almost running into people. I'm also the guy checking out at all the entryways.

Why? Because of these...

How could an ol' energy engineer like me not get excited to check out all these ratings?

This is transparency—and it's part of a building decarbonization playbook that is spreading throughout the world. It goes something like this:

1. Mandatory benchmarking—forcing us to calculate our energy (or carbon) use index and compare it to similar buildings
2. Mandatory disclosure—making your score public (AKA transparency)
3. Procurement changes—large tenants (like the government) can then decide they will not rent space from any building below a certain score
4. Performance standards—mandatory reduction in carbon emissions with fines if not met

Carlos Flores of NABERS in Australia shared Australia's version of this playbook on the Nexus podcast last December. These buildings here in NYC are on their journey too, with mandatory performance requirements starting with performance year 2024. Cities and countries around the world are working their way through the playbook, too.

And last month, the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed that all public companies be required to publish their emissions AND all climate-related risks to their business, such as those fines for not meeting performance requirements.

This move will drastically increase the number of buildings affected by the playbook in years to come. As IMT's Cliff Majersik said, this will drastically increase demand for high performance buildings.

"These disclosures will lead investors to pay more for shares of companies that own high performing buildings that already comply with BPS. Building owners will respond by investing more to improve the performance of their buildings. This market dynamic will serve as a force multiplier, accelerating and increasing the market transformation impact of BPS, reducing GHG emissions, and helping BPS to achieve their intended outcomes."

What does this playbook mean for your business or buildings?

Hit reply and let me know,

—James Dice, Founder of Nexus Labs

P.S. Go deeper and explore the challenges in navigating all the siloed and disconnected tools along the decarbonization journey.

✖ At the Nexus

Here’s everything worth sharing from Nexus HQ this week:

★ PODCAST: 🎧 #094: The ESG data gap with Ryan Knudson—Macerich is a real estate company focused on what they call high quality real estate centers that successful retailers see as must-have locations across the US.

Ryan manages technology and energy across the 53 million square foot portfolio, so naturally we talked about Macerich’s ESG targets, the technology helping them reach those targets, and the challenges and opportunities Ryan sees along the way.

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★ MEMBERS-ONLY EVENTS THIS MONTH:

• Subject Matter Expert Workshop: The co-Founders of LogCheck (acquired by Building Engines last year), Mike Brown (Pro Member) and Ben Ragheb, will present on building operations, the problems LogCheck solved, and their experience starting and selling the company.
• Member Gathering: The panel for April's Pro Member Gathering is made up of Pro members Alec Manfre, CEO and Co-founder at Bractlet, Christopher Naismith, CEO at Audette, Matt Brown, Founder & Head of Product at Simuwatt. They will chat with the group about digitizing the decarbonization project development process.

Join Nexus Pro now to get the invites and access to the recordings.

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★ March Member's Digest (Pro members only)—A collection of recent highlights from the Nexus Pro community, including our latest addition to the community library: The KPIs database (pictured above).

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★ ON LINKEDIN: Help us get the Nexus Labs LinkedIn account over 1000 followers!

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★ READ OF THE WEEK: “Give it away, give it away, give it away now” — Counter positioning in legacy industries (By: Rick Zullo, GP & Co-founder at Equal Ventures)

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👋 That's all for this week. See you next Tuesday!