There is no requirement to post this notice on the Environmental Registry of Ontario, but we wanted to hear your thoughts. Thank you for your feedback.
This consultation was open from:
October 17, 2022
to December 1, 2022
Decision summary
Ontario Regulation 507/18 under the Electricity Act, 1998 (EA), which required Broader Public Sector (BPS) organizations to report their annual energy use to the Ministry of Energy, was revoked and replaced with a new regulation, Ontario Regulation 25/23: Broader Public Sector: Energy Reporting and Conservation and Demand Management Plans.
Decision details
The new regulation streamlines reporting and tracking of energy use by requiring that prescribed BPS organizations report their energy use through the widely used ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager electronic reporting system. The regulation also provides for new phased in reporting deadlines and removes prescriptive measurement units.
O. Reg. 507/18 under the Electricity Act, 1998, titled Broader Public Sector: Energy Reporting and Conservation and Demand Management Plans, was revoked and replaced with the new reporting regulation O. Reg. 25/23 for BPS organizations in Ontario. This new regulation aims to streamline reporting, simplify language, and eliminate duplicative and unclear reporting requirements.
O. Reg. 25/23 retains many of the provisions in the former regulation and does not change the policy intent of the former BPS energy reporting regulation. Key changes in the new regulation include the following:
- Streamlines reporting and tracking of energy use by moving reporting from a custom-made platform that has reached the end of its life, to the widely used ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager electronic reporting system.
- Changes the energy consumption and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reporting period from two calendar years in the past to one calendar year in the past. The phase-in reporting to the previous calendar year is as follows:
- Requires reporting for one year (2021 energy data) in 2023 with no change to the current reporting requirements.
- Requires reporting for two years (2022 and 2023 energy data) in 2024 as a transitional year.
- Starting in 2025, requires reporting for one year (2024 energy data in 2025).
- Updates prescriptive elements of the regulation, such as the title of the form, and removes specific units of measurement to allow BPS organizations to select the units they want to report in as long as it is an industry standard.
The new regulation offers the following benefits:
- Updates an outdated technology platform that has reached the end of its life.
- Simplifies reporting processes and standardize units of measurement in energy use reporting.
- Provides BPS organizations with more timely and comparable energy use and GHG emissions information to support conservation and demand management (CDM) planning.
- Harmonizes reporting requirements with other jurisdictions across Canada and United States, including private building owners as part of Ontario’s Energy and Water Reporting and Benchmarking (EWRB) initiative.
The new regulation takes effect on February 23, 2023.
Effects of consultation
ENERGY’s proposal outlining the proposed amendments was posted on the Environmental Registry of Ontario (ERO) and the Regulatory Registry (RR) for 45 days from October 17 to December 1, 2022. The ministry sent email notifications to all BPS organizations and other stakeholders at the time of the posting on the ERO/RR.
ENERGY, in total, received 14 comments on the posting. The comments were overall supportive of the proposed amendments and the move to Portfolio Manager.
A number of BPS organizations stressed the importance of thorough training and implementation assistance, emphasizing the necessity to provide their personnel with the tools needed to facilitate the shift to Portfolio Manager.
One comment centered around cyber security asking for further information on where the data would be stored in Portfolio Manager.
Other feedback highlighted that the next CDM plans from BPS organizations are due in 2024, which is the same year that the ministry is planning to have dual reporting. They recommended that the ministry consider changing the dual-year deadline from July to later in the same year.
All comments received were given full consideration by the ministry.
Supporting materials
View materials in person
Some supporting materials may not be available online. If this is the case, you can request to view the materials in person.
Get in touch with the office listed below to find out if materials are available.
77 Grenville St., 5th floor
Toronto,
ON
M7A 2C1
Canada
Connect with us
Contact
Nupur Deonarine
77 Grenville St., 5th floor
Toronto,
ON
M7A 2C1
Canada
Original proposal
Why consultation isn't required
The Electricity Act is not prescribed under the EBR.
Proposal details
These changes would streamline reporting and tracking of energy use by moving required energy reporting from the current SharePoint 2013 platform (that has reached the end of its life) to the widely used ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager electronic reporting system. Further changes would: phase in reporting of energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions data to the previous calendar year (rather than two calendar years in the past) and update prescriptive elements of the regulation.
O.Reg 507/18 requires broader public sector (BPS) organizations to report their buildings’ annual energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions data for the year, two calendar years in the past to the Ministry of Energy by July 1. This includes information on the gross floor area of their buildings, identifying information, energy consumption, and performance metrics such as greenhouse gas emissions.
The Ministry of Energy is proposing amendments to O.Reg 507/18 to:
- Streamline reporting and tracking of energy use by moving reporting from a custom-made platform that has reached the end of its life, to the widely used ENERGY STAR Portfolio Manager electronic reporting system.
- Change the energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions reporting period from two calendar years in the past to one calendar year in the past.
- Phase in reporting to the previous calendar year as follows:
- require reporting for one year (2021 energy data) in 2023. No change to current reporting requirements
- require reporting for two years (2022 and 2023 energy data) in 2024 as a transitional year
- starting in 2025, require reporting for one year (2024 energy data in 2025)
- The ministry will support BPS organizations with the dual reporting requirement in the transitional year (2024).
- Phase in reporting to the previous calendar year as follows:
- Update prescriptive elements of the regulation such as the exact title of the form, units of measurement, and fields for which data is collected, and referencing a Guide. This guide could provide BPS organizations with detailed information on how to report their building’s energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions and could be updated from time to time as needed.
The proposed updates would support the feedback received from BPS organizations and the replacement of the current portal used for BPS energy reporting, moving it from SharePoint 2013 to Portfolio Manager.
Analysis of Regulatory Impact:
Ontario’s broader public sector (BPS) energy reporting regulation (O.Reg 507/18) was developed in 2011 to help organizations better understand how and where they used energy, and identify potential conservation opportunities. Support from the sector for this program has been strong since the regulation has been in place.
The proposed changes to the BPS regulation would clarify the reporting requirements and result in more timely and comparable energy use and greenhouse gas information for BPS organizations through Portfolio Manager. Moving reporting to the previous calendar year will provide more current information to organizations that would support conservation and demand management planning.
By using Portfolio Manager, BPS organizations would have access to a widely used energy reporting platform that is free to use and offers several pre-built energy benchmarking reports that would no longer need to be calculated manually. Organizations would also have access to more meaningful and comparable energy and greenhouse gas emission calculations, as Portfolio Manager is used by several jurisdictions across North America. Portfolio Manager would also offer time savings in the form of automated data validation while allowing the use of Excel to import and export data.
BPS organizations have experience in collecting and reporting their energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions data to the ministry over the last ten years. There may be fiscal implications as organizations transition to reporting in Portfolio Manager and to reporting for the previous calendar year. The ministry will review options to support BPS organizations through this transition.
Supporting materials
View materials in person
Some supporting materials may not be available online. If this is the case, you can request to view the materials in person.
Get in touch with the office listed below to find out if materials are available.
77 Grenville St., 5th floor
Toronto,
ON
M7A 2C1
Canada
Comment
Commenting is now closed.
This consultation was open from October 17, 2022
to December 1, 2022
Connect with us
Contact
Nupur Deonarine
77 Grenville St., 5th floor
Toronto,
ON
M7A 2C1
Canada
Comments received
Through the registry
13By email
1By mail
0