About the LBT

The Laboratory Benchmarking Tool (LBT) is the successor to the Labs21 Benchmarking Tool, which was retired in 2019 after 16 years of service. The LBT provides a modern graphing interface, along with many new and reconfigured data fields designed to meet the needs of today's lab community. Additional modules are frequently added to the LBT to further expand its functionality.

The LBT is sponsored by the Federal Energy Management Program at the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). It was developed by kW Engineering, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and the International Institute for Sustainable Laboratories (I2SL). LBT Internationalization was sponsored by Siemens Smart Infrastructure and was developed by I2SL and kW Engineering. The Portfolio Manager Connection, Operational Practices module, and metric units mode were sponsored by FEMP and were developed by LBNL and kW Engineering. Other modules were developed by I2SL’s Labs2Zero program; see below for details. Questions and feedback about the LBT can be directed to lbt@i2sl.org.

I2SL's Labs2Zero Sponsors

Development of the Labs2Zero components of the LBT was supported by I2SL's Labs2Zero program and implemented by I2SL, kW Engineering, and StackIT. These components include the Energy Score, Energy Score Target Setting Module, the Operational Emissions Score, Embodied Carbon Benchmarking, and the AIM Report. I2SL's Labs2Zero Sponsors are listed below.

Release Notes

v1.80, August 2025
Actionable Insights and Measures (AIM) Report. For additional details please refer to the AIM Help documentation.

• Addition of AIM software module (v2).
• Release version includes 26 measures, case studies, paywall, and Demo.
• AIM banners throughout LBT.
• New AIM Help documentation and FAQs (help.i2sl.org).
• Minor changes to LBT help text and field locations.

v1.70, 10 May 2024
Energy Score Target Setter, Operational Emissions Scoring, Embodied Carbon Benchmarking. For additional details please refer to the FAQs.

• Energy Score Target Setter page
• Pilot Labs2Zero Operational Emissions Score (location-based) calculation for all buildings in database.
• Changes to default grid electric emissions factors (U.S. and non-U.S.) and to handling of central plant/district utility emissions factors.
• Collection of additional operational GHG emissions data fields.
• New calculated fields relating to operational GHG emissions.
• Expansion to In Design or In Construction buildings.
• Addition of Embodied Carbon data fields.
• New Embodied Carbon Benchmarking Analysis page.
• Temporary retirement of Actionable Insights Module.
• New FAQs and documentation for all new features.
• Climate zone lookup bug fix.
• Alignment of fiscal year naming (now using end month of year).

v1.60, 16 October 2023
Energy Score Module. For additional details please refer to the FAQ.

• Pilot Labs2Zero Energy Score calculation for all buildings in database.
• Connection to degreedays.net for weather data.
• Pilot Energy Scores added to charts.
• New Building Details page with Performance Over Time chart.
• Source EUI calculation reinstated for non-US buildings.
• New Pilot Energy Score Warnings table shows scoring caveats for selected buildings.
• New FAQs for Pilot Energy Score

v1.50, 7 October 2022
LBT Internationalization: part 2 of 2. For additional details please refer to the FAQ.

• Added worldwide address capabilities with google address lookup, and backfilled existing addresses to comply with new format.
• Added currency selector, with exchange rates taken from currencyfreaks.com on 1 Sept 2022. All existing entries were treated as US$.
• Updated US GHG emissions to use 2020 state-by-state values from eGrid (via carbonfootprint.com) and added international GHG factors using 2020 data from ourworldindata.org. District hot water GHG emissions use Energy Star 2022 standard. District chilled water emissions use Energy Star 2022 standard, but scaled by electricity GHG factor for building's location. GHG emissions intensities of existing buildings will have changed as a result of this update. [note: this was superseded in May 2024]
• Source energy is now only calculated for US buildings, using Energy Star 2018 national averages. [note: this was superseded in October 2023]
• Site EUI is now the default view for charts.
• Added filters for region and country.
• Updated climate zone calculator to include non-US locations and to use latest version of ASHRAE Standard 169-2021. Note that climate zones of some existing buidlings may have changed as a result of using more recent climate classifications.