Time flies when you’re having fun and that’s no different at Smart Buildings Center! We’ve had a busy July and to make it easy to catch-up with us we’ve consolidated the biggest headlines into the blog post below. You can click each headline to be taken right to the story as it originally appeared.

We’re excited to announce our SBX Day 2 Opening Keynote “Accelerating Performance at the Speed of Innovation” | Last Chance for Early-Bird Pricing!

Megan Owen, Senior Vice President of Strategy and Markets at McKinstry, will deliver an opening keynote that focuses on the changing landscape for building owners and managers and how cost pressure, resilience, risk, security, operational complexity, and AI are reshaping expectations for smart buildings.

Megan’s insightful strategic approach is defined by never-ending curiosity and the ability to visualize and champion development and direction for McKinstry and its clients. With a focus on market strategy across all McKinstry operations, Megan’s experience and leadership have led to complex high-profile projects and advancements in climate and energy policy across the country. By establishing and strengthening market strategy, sales enablement, marketing and government affairs, Megan has shaped McKinstry’s go-to-market approaches to ensure success and client satisfaction.

Prior to joining McKinstry, Megan served as former Washington Gov. Chris Gregoire’s director of King County outreach. In this role, she united public and private entities around common interests. Her passion for stakeholder engagement and removing climate harm from the built environment is shared beyond McKinstry through nonprofit support and service. She currently serves on the board of directors of the NW Energy Coalition.

Stay tuned for more exciting speaker announcements soon!

The early-bird registration deadline is August 15^th. Register now to join us at the event on November 9^th & 10^th and save!

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BOC earns Energy Skilled Recognition from DOE

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We’re spreading the word! Our friends at Seattle Office of Sustainability and Environment have a new reporting portal and compliance tool for 2026 energy data!

New Seattle Building & Energy Portal Now Available for Building Reporting

The Seattle Building & Energy Portal is now live for Energy Benchmarking reporting. Current features can help building owners and representatives submit outstanding 2025 Energy Benchmarking data and get you ready for future building reporting requirements. BEPS compliance features and guidance will roll out in early 2027.

Reminders about the new Building & Energy Portal:

• Portal resource page now available: Visit the new Portal resource page at seattle.gov/building-and-energy-portal. This is where you’ll go to log in to and learn about the new Portal, access user guides, track compliance reporting deadlines, and more.
• Seamless transition with ENERGY STAR® Portfolio Manager®: The Portal syncs with building owners’ existing ESPM accounts. It will become your central spot for compliance, reporting, and technical assistance for Energy Benchmarking and BEPS.
• Changes to benchmarking compliance process: All covered buildings will now need to use the new Building & Energy Portal to comply with Energy Benchmarking for 2026 by June 1, 2027.
• Portal access codes coming soon: The City of Seattle will send notification letters to all building owners later this year. These letters will have custom claim codes to link your buildings and set up more users in your Portal account, helping you prepare for benchmarking reports due in 2027 and for future BEPS reporting.

Access the Portal and find Portal resources

Confirm Your Compliance Status with the Compliance Look-Up Tool

You can now use the new Compliance Look-Up Tool to confirm your compliance status for reporting 2025 energy benchmarking data that was due on June 1, 2026.

Look up your building’s Energy Benchmarking compliance status

Reminder: Submit Outstanding 2025 Benchmarking Data Through the New Building & Energy Portal

Buildings that still need to report 2025 data must submit their data under the new compliance process in the Seattle Building & Energy Portal. The City of Seattle will reach out directly to non-compliant building owners to share instructions for getting started and resources to understand benchmarking process changes.

Updates to Seattle Energy Benchmarking Map

The Smart Buildings Center (SBC) and Building Operator Certification (BOC) program are proud to announce the 2026 BOC Operator of the Year: Michael Durham, Lead Mechanic 3 from Edmonds College

Each year, BOC requests nominations for people working to improve the energy efficiency of their work environment using skills they learned in the BOC program. We received many impressive 2026 nominations detailing how methods learned in BOC classes are helping people make improvements in their work environments, but this year Michael’s work stood out among the other candidates.

At Edmonds College, Michael works hard to look for measures that will improve the college’s energy efficiency across all of their 25 buildings and 734,000 square feet of occupied space. In 2026 that meant reducing natural gas usage, replacing single building fans with fan walls in HVAC systems and replacing the plant’s cooling tower with an energy efficient induced draft model. Across the board, Michael’s work saw the incorporation of 143 scheduled spaces throughout the campus and up to a 98% reduction in equipment run time. These efforts even helped inspire the State Board of Community and Technical Colleges to offer an incentive to other colleges to adopt a similar system.

Michael’s hard work and application of concepts he learned in the BOC program resulted in the college saving an estimated 512,000 KWH in energy use over the course of the year. Michael’s tireless dedication to BOC principles, ingenuity in keeping up with the latest trends in energy conservation and building operation, and leadership have been instrumental in the college’s success in reducing its carbon footprint. His BOC training and hard work created the following real-world impacts for Edmonds College:

• Energy savings totaling 512,000 KW Hours in a single year saving $41,000.00 in annual energy savings.

• Estimated energy savings 
  • 38% estimated total energy savings over the past year
    • 15.4% reduction in electricity
    • 52.5% reduction in natural gas

• Estimated EUI Reduction
  • Dropped by 24.56, or 38%
  • Based on the energy data from Gazebo and an estimated 718,023 sq. ft. of buildings campus-wide

The SBC and BOC program applaud Michael on his efforts and congratulate him on being named as 2026 BOC Operator of the Year!

Know someone who deserves recognition for their work in the industry? Nominations will open for the 2027 BOC Operator of the Year award in April, so stay tuned!

Click here for a downloadable and sharable version of this flier!