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). The Actionable Insights module and LBT Internationalization were sponsored by Siemens Smart Infrastructure and were 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. Questions and feedback about the LBT can be directed to lbt@i2sl.org.
About Labs2Zero and the Pilot Energy Score
Development of the Energy Score module was supported by I2SL's Labs2Zero program. I2SL's Labs2Zero Founding Sponsors are listed below.
Release Notes
v1.60, 16 October 2023Energy 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
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.
- Source energy is now only calculated for US buildings, using Energy Star 2018 national averages.
- 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.