Have you heard about the new NYC Real Estate carbon emissions and finance data tool?

Seventy percent of New York City’s carbon emissions comes from the one million buildings in our built environment, making building decarbonization vital for reaching net zero goals. The mortgage banking industry has a crucial role in tackling climate change, providing the needed financing to meet these goals. 

This tool brings together building energy benchmarking data with mortgage lienholder information to provide a comprehensive view of the largest financiers of New York City’s LL97 carbon emissions. But, whether you’re a bank trying to understand and mitigate your scope 3 emissions, a building professional seeking to build an energy retrofit construction pipeline, or an individual looking to incentivize climate action, this data tool can help:

  • Search by mortgage lienholder to see a lender’s total portfolio of buildings subject to Local Law 97, aggregated and individually.

  • Search by neighborhood, address, or building use to find retrofit opportunities.

  • Search by compliance pathway to see the carbon footprint of building categories over time and regulatory change.

The NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business (CSB) launched this public data tool as part of its multi-year Invest NYC SDG initiative, in collaboration with the Chao-Hon Chen Institute for Global Real Estate Finance at the NYU Stern and the Urban Green Council. This building map of NYC was created to support the financing of energy efficiency and clean energy projects for buildings subject to Local Law 97 and was originally launched in a beta form in collaboration with the Mayor’s Office of Climate and Sustainability (MOCS) and the NYC Energy Efficiency Corporation (NYCEEC). 
 

TO BEGIN USING THE NYC DECARBONIZATION COMPASS TOOL, PLEASE CLICK THE LINK BELOW

Cornerstone Insights

We are proud to have been a part of this project and would like to thank The NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business (CSB) for creating such a useful and innovative tool. 

New York City’s Climate Mobilization Act includes eleven pieces of legislation, but the centerpiece of this legislation is a carbon emissions limit for large NYC buildings (Local Law 97). While Local Law 97 (LL97) places requirements for NYC’s building owners, it also presents opportunities. Local Law 97 (LL97) compliance begins in 2024, but implementing energy management strategies for your multifamily properties doesn’t happen overnight, so the time to plan is now. It’s a good time to lay the groundwork for making comprehensive energy-saving upgrades or establishing on-going energy management strategies for your properties.

LL97 sets out a methodology for calculating carbon emissions limits for each covered building. All buildings over 25,000 square feet in total floor area and two or more buildings on the same tax lot that together exceed 50,000 square feet (including condominiums and cooperatives) must adhere to the law, although certain buildings have alternate requirements. Buildings will need to submit a report each year, prepared by a registered design professional, showing their calculated limit as well as their carbon emissions for the previous year. Buildings that emit carbon over their calculated limit are subject to a fine. 

If you have any questions about LL97, or if you would like to discuss an upcoming or prospective transaction, please contact us.

Thanks, and have a great week.