Planning Guides
Strategic decarbonization planning (SDP) is a comprehensive approach to retrofitting buildings that aligns decarbonization activities with typical real estate cycles to cost-effectively achieve deep reductions in emissions. By integrating technical solutions with real estate capital plans, project teams can develop holistic, optimized decarbonization roadmaps for their buildings that prioritize flexibility, reduce risk, and unlock long-term value.
This guide distills proven practices from NYSERDA’s Empire Building Challenge and the Guide to Strategic Decarbonization Planning, a resource developed collaboratively by ASHRAE, U.S. Green Building Council, and NYSERDA. It offers a flexible set of strategies that can be tailored to your building, team, and timeline—whether the work is led internally or supported by consultants.
The best practices detailed in this guide illustrate that through careful planning, smart phasing, and strategically timed investments, common roadblocks to decarbonization can be overcome to yield meaningful emissions reductions and increased asset value.
Initiating a Strategic Decarbonization Planning project
Early decisions can make or break your decarbonization planning process. Set the stage for success by engaging stakeholders and clearly defining team roles, project scope, and goals. Ensuring alignment early on avoids confusion—and costly detours—later.
Establish Clear, Aligned Goals
Most projects start with high-level goals—but deep decarbonization requires more than broad intentions. Vaguely defined aspirations can lead to scope drift, delays, or missed investment opportunities. Instead, goals must be clearly defined, measurable, and aligned with the expectations of key decision-makers.
Each goal should include a specific metric and target. For example, instead of a general aim like “improve indoor air quality,” use quantifiable outcomes such as maintaining CO₂ levels below 1,000 ppm or keeping indoor relative humidity between 30–60%.
If you’re pursuing multiple goals—such as reducing emissions, improving resilience, and maintaining tenant comfort—identify potential synergies and trade-offs early. Recognizing where objectives reinforce or compete with one another helps guide better design and investment decisions.
Just as important: identify the decision-makers. Confirm these leaders understand the goals, support them, and are committed to seeing them through. Early alignment at this level prevents costly missteps down the line.
Helpful Resources
Engage Tenants
In leased commercial buildings, tenant rents drive net operating income—and by extension, asset value. As such, tenant engagement and buy-in is critical to the success of decarbonization efforts. Bringing tenants to the table early ensures their priorities are considered when setting goals and defining scope. It helps uncover legitimate concerns, reveal operational constraints, and build trust. Early conversations also create the opportunity to discuss lease modifications—whether to enable cost recovery, set performance standards, or ensure future access for upgrades.
The result: a more workable, widely supported plan—built in partnership with those most materially impacted.
Helpful Resources
Choose the Right Analysis Tools
Strategic decarbonization planning can rely on tools ranging from simple spreadsheets to calibrated energy models. The right choice depends on your goals and the complexity of your project.
Start with the end in mind: What outputs do decision-makers need? What measures are you evaluating? And what are your timeline, budget, and risk tolerance? Right-sizing the analysis ensures results are actionable without wasting time on unnecessary complexity. Overanalyzing can burn resources, while under analyzing risks poorly supported decisions.
The Playbook highlights best practices that require capable tools. For example, your analysis may need to address a number of aspects, such as the interactive effects between upgrades, accurately sizing equipment for peak loads, or demand management using time-of-day data.
If you’re analyzing in-house, define tools and scope early to guide data collection and timelines. If using consultants, ensure your analysis goals and scope are clearly defined in the contract.
Helpful Resources
