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In 2022 a board member approached IDEA about launching a carbon accounting initiative to accompany our longstanding District Energy Space Report. Every year since 1990 IDEA member systems have submitted data on the number of new or recommitted customer buildings and the square foot area that represents. The report distinguishes between North America and Beyond North America markets and identifies by services provided (heating, cooling, both) and building use (i.e. commercial office; residential, etc).
IDEA’s hope is that, over time, it will similarly be able to demonstrate the district energy industry’s overall efforts towards decarbonization through our Carbon Count initiative. Due to its ability to implement lower-carbon and renewable solutions at scale, district energy can be a faster path to net-zero for cities, college campuses, hospitals, and other clusters of networked buildings seeking cost-effective carbon reduction measures. Having a tool to track carbon emissions will also help IDEA to showcase innovation and best practices in our sector and assess carbon mitigation results by system and in aggregate.
IDEA is approaching the tool like a pilot program. In the first phase, they ask IDEA members to fill in a slightly truncated version of the CarbonHub record upload sheet and submit it to us via email. After receiving the information, the IDEA team will double-check the data and upload it into CarbonHub. Eventually, IDEA hopes to give submitters the option of directly importing their data into CarbonHub and managing submissions on a rolling basis.
IDEA is in an interesting position with this project because they’re aggregating the carbon reporting efforts of other organizations, rather than managing the entire process themselves.
This required them to design a data submission process that can accommodate a full spectrum of carbon accounting expertise: some university systems have been participating in robust annual reporting processes for years (through the AASHE STARS program or other reporting framework), some utility members are required to report emissions to state or federal governments, and some systems are just starting out. Some of systems are also required to report to different governing bodies using different reporting methodologies, and IDEA is sensitive to the fact that adding yet another annual accounting process (especially if we were to dictate an accounting system that produced differing final emissions numbers) may be both onerous and politically fraught.
In the first year, they opted to allow systems to submit data generated via any methodology and pledged to present data only in aggregated and anonymized formats. This worked well for systems with robust carbon accounting programs but didn’t offer enough support for systems just beginning to dabble in carbon accounting. IDEA selected EnergyCAP CarbonHub as a platform for its ease of use and because the ability to submit commodities helps bridge this knowledge gap.
The goal is to encourage and grow IDEA member participation in this program, as members are in different places in their sustainability journey. CarbonHub allows the opportunity to have a central, user-friendly location where carbon data across systems can be inputted and aggregated.
In the first year, a steering committee was formed to create Carbon Count and helped develop an overall framework for data collection and reporting into a spreadsheet, modeled in part on the District Energy Space submission form, which captured Scope 1 and 2 emissions. After the first-year trial, IDEA evaluated and decided to transition over to EnergyCAP CarbonHub because the system allows them to significantly uplevel their efforts. It has flexibility in what forms of data can be submitted and offers more robust reporting tools, which is particularly valuable for systems without preexisting carbon accounting protocols. There are over 600 district energy systems operating today in North America, and thousands more in Europe, Middle East, Asia, and Asia Pacific. The industry is growing rapidly, so IDEA needs the ability to assess the carbon emissions advantages and scale.
As of 2024, there are 11 organizations reporting 18 individual district energy systems through the EnergyCAP Carbon Hub.
District energy systems can produce significant decarbonization opportunities for connected buildings at scale using energy recovery, efficiency investments, fuel flexibility, thermal storage, geo-exchange and geothermal generation, and renewable integration. These are changes that can be made at the plant level with immediate positive effects on connected buildings. There are systems across the US (and the world) that are demonstrating a range of diverse paths to decarbonization. IDEA’s hope is that, by collecting the emissions data and decarbonization strategies being deployed, they will be better able to harmonize results, share progress underway, and encourage others to replicate these successful outcomes.
As cities, states, provinces, and federal governments consider rule-making, policies and regulations to cut carbon emissions, it is important that district energy systems are fully recognized for their many advantages. Additionally, investors and institutions will be interested in how district energy systems can unlock value and enhance competitiveness in a carbon-constrained world.
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