The Top 6 Sustainability Metrics for Commercial Real Estate: What to Track & Why They Matter

Your guide to energy efficiency, carbon tracking, and sustainable performance metrics in CRE.

The real estate industry is no stranger to sustainability headlines, but today’s landscape feels more like a pressure cooker than a polished PR campaign. As regulatory, investor, and tenant scrutiny intensifies, so too has a growing backlash—prompted by concerns about cost, complexity, and political overreach. This hasn’t slowed the urgency for better environmental performance; it’s shifted the spotlight to proving impact with rigor and transparency. Glossy commitments are no longer enough. Real estate owners and operators must not only  show that their strategies align with sustainable principles, but also deliver quantifiable bottom-line results.

Against such a backdrop, it’s no surprise that many CRE teams report feeling overwhelmed, not undercommitted. The deluge of frameworks, carbon rules, and rating systems has created what many call the “ESG metrics maze.” Instead of tracking everything, real estate leaders must thus sharpen their focus on the performance indicators that matter most—metrics that influence operational, financial, and reputational outcomes.

This is the moment when cutting through the noise matters. Instead of tracking everything, real estate leaders need to sharpen their focus on the environmental performance metrics that have genuine operational, financial, and reputational impact. What matters is not the volume of metrics you track or frameworks you report to —but whether you’re tracking the right ones, consistently, and in a way that drives sound decision-making across your business.

In this article, we’ll break down the key environmental metrics every real estate leader should prioritize—explaining not just what they are, but why they matter, how to calculate them, and how they can be used as drivers of action, not just more reporting. 

The 6 Most Important Sustainability Metrics for Commercial Real Estate

1. Energy Use Intensity (EUI)

EUI is calculated by dividing a building’s total annual energy consumption by its gross floor area. It’s typically expressed as kBtu/ft²/year (or kWh/m²/year in metric systems).

Formula: EUI = Total Energy Consumption (kBtu or kWh) ÷ Gross Floor Area (ft² or m²)

Why It’s Critical:

• EUI is a baseline indicator of building energy efficiency, allowing CRE teams to compare performance across assets or against national/regional benchmarks.
• It underpins many sustainability certifications and building performance standards
• Helps prioritize optimizations and retrofits (by facilitating "apples to apples" comparisons across buildings) and quantify savings from operational improvements.
  

How to Track It Accurately:

• Gather total energy usage for a 12-month period from utility bills, meters, or sub-meter data. This includes all energy sources: electricity, natural gas, district steam, fuel oil, etc.
• Use consistent gross floor area (GFA) based on BOMA standards or local code definitions.
• Normalization (e.g., for weather, occupancy, or operational hours) is optional, but useful for more nuanced performance analysis—especially in diverse portfolios.
  

Tracking Tools:

• Noda’s platform can ingest utility data and floor area records to calculate EUI at the building and portfolio level—automatically, and in real-time.
  

Pro Tip: Disaggregate EUI by fuel type (electricity vs. gas vs. steam, as applicable) to identify where targeted energy-saving measures will have the most impact.

2. Carbon / GHG Emissions Intensity 

Carbon intensity measures the greenhouse gas emissions generated per unit of building area, typically in kgCO₂e/ft²/year or metric tons CO₂e per year per asset. Emissions are categorized into three scopes:

• Scope 1: Direct emissions from on-site combustion (e.g., natural gas boilers)
• Scope 2: Indirect emissions from purchased utilities 
• Scope 3: Other indirect emissions, such as tenant-controlled energy use 
  

Why It’s Critical:

• Central to net-zero goals, carbon neutrality claims, and climate disclosures
• Required by leading frameworks like CDP and GRESB
• Required by certain BPS standards, like New York's LL97 and Boston's BERDO
• Signals a firm’s environmental performance to investors and regulators
  

How to Track It Accurately:

• Collect energy usage data and apply appropriate emissions factors from the EPA, IEA, or utility providers
• Report by scope to maintain transparency and traceability
• For tenant-controlled spaces, best practice is to install submeters to accurately calculate and monitor Scope 3 emissions, but apportioning by floor area can offer a faster pathway if submeters are not feasible. Use this calculation provided by the GHG Protocol:
  
  Energy use from leased space (kWh) = (reporting company’s area (m2)) / (building’s total area (m2) × building’s occupancy rate (e.g., 0.75)) × building’s total energy use (kWh)
  
• Re-baseline annually to reflect operational changes or improvements

Tracking Tools:

• Carbon accounting platforms (e.g., SIERA, GHG Protocol tools)
• Noda automates GHG intensity calculations and Scope 1 and 2 tracking, and can provide turnkey submeter installations for accurate Scope 3 accounting
  

Pro Tip: If you purchase Renewable Energy Credits (RECs) or offsets, report them separately to avoid double-counting and maintain clarity.

3. Emissions Reduction / Avoided Emissions

This metric quantifies the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions compared to a defined baseline year, expressed as a percentage reduction or total metric tons CO₂e avoided.

Formula: Avoided Emissions = Baseline Year Emissions − Current Year Emissions

Why It’s Critical:

• Measures actual impact of energy efficiency projects, retrofits, or renewables
• Required by net-zero and the Science-Based Targets Initiative (SBTi)
• Builds trust with investors and regulators by demonstrating progress
  

How to Track It Accurately:

• Establish a baseline year (e.g., 2019) and methodology. Leverage the GHG Protocol's calculation tools for calculating an accurate GHG inventory.
• Track annual emissions across scopes using consistent factors
• Attribute reductions to specific initiatives and projects where possible
  

Tracking Tools:

• Dashboards in platforms like Noda, which can also help you set emissions reductions targets and allocate emissions savings to individual project work 

Pro Tip: Visualizing cumulative emissions reductions across years can help you highlight the true long-term impact of your efforts. 

4. Water Use Intensity (WUI)

WUI represents the total water consumed annually divided by the building’s floor area or number of occupants. Units are usually gallons/ft²/year or liters/occupant/day.

Why It’s Critical:

• Essential for operations in water-scarce regions
• Integral to LEED and ESG certifications
• Influences utility expenses and tenant perception
  

How to Track It Accurately:

• Collect data from water utility bills or meters/submeters 
• Segment by end-use (cooling, irrigation, domestic, etc.)
• Normalize for occupancy or seasonal variation as needed
  

Tracking Tools:

• Water meters and Noda for aggregated portfolio insights
  

Pro Tip: Install smart water meters to detect leaks and support optimizing usage in real-time.

5. Waste Diversion Rate

The percentage of total building waste that is diverted from landfills through recycling, composting, or reuse.

Formula: Diversion Rate = (Recycled + Composted + Reused Waste) ÷ Total Waste Generated

Why It’s Critical:

• Reduces landfill contributions and disposal costs
• Demonstrates responsible operations to tenants and communities
• Often mandated by city ordinances and ESG frameworks
  

How to Track It Accurately:

• Partner with waste haulers to access reliable data
• Track monthly and categorize by material stream (paper, plastics, organic, etc.)
• Validate hauler-reported data periodically
  

Tracking Tools:

• Waste audit tools or LEED calculators
  

Pro Tip: Engage tenants through signage, contests, or digital nudges to increase participation in waste reduction programs.

6. Renewable Energy Adoption

The proportion of total building energy consumption that is met by on-site or off-site renewable sources, such as solar, wind, or green power purchase agreements (PPAs).

Formula: Renewable Share = Renewable Energy Consumed ÷ Total Energy Consumption

Why It’s Critical:

• Drives decarbonization and supports net-zero claims
• May qualify for tax incentives and renewable certifications
• Demonstrates long-term climate alignment to stakeholders
• Onsite renewables can defray ongoing utility costs, supporting your bottom line
  

How to Track It Accurately:

• Monitor on-site generation through solar inverters or BMS
• Document off-site renewable contracts and REC purchases
• Report separately from local grid renewable mix
  

Tracking Tools:

• Integration with BMS systems, vendor-provided dashboards, or platforms like Noda
  

Pro Tip: Quantify avoided emissions from renewables separately for better reporting clarity.

Tools & Best Practices: How to Track ESG Metrics Effectively

Collecting data is just the beginning. To drive real performance gains, real estate sustainability teams must make these metrics visible, actionable, and comparable. Here's how:

Centralize Data Sources

Consolidate utility bills, meter and submeter data, BMS outputs, and third-party audits in a single platform (like Noda) to eliminate data silos and facilitate ongoing analysis, optimization, and reporting. 

Automate Data Capture

Leverage automation, APIs, and integrations to reduce manual entry and improve the frequency and accuracy of updates.

Normalize for Context

Adjust for occupancy rates, weather, and square footage to ensure fair and accurate performance comparisons between individual assets, asset types, regions, funds, and any other groupings that exist across your portfolio. 

Benchmark and Set Targets

Compare assets across your portfolio and against national/regional standards. Use those insights to set short- and long-term sustainability goals.

Communicate With Transparency

Use dashboards and reports to share performance with internal teams, investors, tenants, and other stakeholders. Be open about gaps and progress.

Final Thoughts: Start Smart, Scale Fast

You don’t need to master every single sustainability data point overnight. The key is to start with what matters most. By focusing on these six foundational metrics—like energy use intensity, carbon emissions, and water consumption—you’ll lay the groundwork for meaningful progress without getting lost in complexity. These metrics aren’t just for compliance or reporting; they’re tools for smarter decision-making, operational efficiency, and long-term value creation.

As your organization matures in its sustainability journey, building out stronger data infrastructure, automating collection, and integrating insights into daily workflows will enable more nuanced analysis and faster response times from operational teams. Over time, this approach will reveal trends, surface inefficiencies, and highlight opportunities you may not have seen before.

Platforms like Noda are designed to help you accelerate this evolution—by centralizing your data, automating the calculation of key metrics, and turning insight into action. Start with focus, build with clarity, and scale with confidence.

About Noda

Noda is a data and analytics company on a mission to make every building smarter, more efficient, and more sustainable. Recently ranked in the top 10 tech companies leading the charge on climate action, its AI-powered suite of products surface unique insights that empower real estate teams to reduce costs, decrease time spent on routine work, and find and act on opportunities to save energy and carbon. Discover how Noda's solutions can unlock the potential of your assets and accelerate the transition to net zero. Visit us at noda.ai to learn more.