Energy | sustainsurveying

ENERGY EFFICIENCY

Energy, Property and Building Performance

Energy is a fundamental consideration in the sustainability and performance of property.

Buildings require energy for heating, cooling, lighting, ventilation, equipment and other services. The way that energy is supplied and used affects operating costs, carbon emissions, occupier comfort and the environmental performance of an asset. Improving energy performance is therefore an important part of creating and maintaining more sustainable buildings.

Energy and Surveying

Energy increasingly influences decisions across property surveying.

Surveyors may encounter energy considerations when advising on acquisition, valuation, leasing, property management, refurbishment, retrofit, investment and development.

Understanding the energy performance of a property can help owners, occupiers and investors identify potential risks, costs and opportunities for improvement.

RICS's 2026 Sustainability practice for surveyors places energy within a wider approach to sustainable property, connecting building performance with carbon reduction, climate resilience, investment and long-term value.

RICS – Sustainability practice for surveyors

Understanding Building Energy Performance

Energy performance depends upon the interaction between the building, its services and the way it is occupied.

Relevant considerations can include:

building fabric and insulation
heating and cooling
ventilation and air conditioning
lighting
controls and building-management systems
equipment and appliances
patterns of occupation
maintenance and commissioning
energy source and supply
renewable-energy generation.

A building's theoretical energy performance and its actual energy consumption may not always be the same.

Understanding how a property performs in use can therefore be as important as understanding how it was designed to perform.

Energy Efficiency

Reducing unnecessary energy demand is an important starting point for improving building performance.

Measures may range from relatively straightforward changes to building management and controls through to improvements in building fabric, services or major refurbishment.

The appropriate response depends upon the property, its condition, construction, use, occupation and the objectives of the owner or occupier.

Energy improvements should therefore be considered as part of a wider understanding of the building rather than as isolated interventions.

Energy and Retrofit

Much of the property that will be occupied in the coming decades already exists.

Improving the energy performance of existing buildings is consequently an important part of the transition towards a lower-carbon built environment.

Retrofit might include improvements to building fabric, heating and cooling systems, ventilation, lighting, controls or renewable-energy technologies.

However, interventions need to be appropriate to the building. Changes to one element can affect others, including moisture movement, ventilation, indoor environmental quality and occupant comfort.

A whole-building approach can therefore help avoid unintended consequences and identify combinations of measures that are appropriate to the particular property.

Energy and Carbon

Energy and carbon are closely connected, but they are not the same thing.

Reducing operational energy consumption can reduce the carbon emissions associated with running a building. However, changes to a property can themselves involve carbon emissions through the manufacture, transportation and installation of materials and equipment.

A whole-life perspective therefore considers operational carbon alongside embodied carbon.

This can be particularly important when comparing refurbishment, retrofit and redevelopment options.

Energy, Cost and Value

Energy performance can also have financial implications.

Energy consumption affects operating costs, while improvements may require capital expenditure. Owners and investors therefore need to consider the relationship between initial investment, future energy savings, maintenance, asset performance and the expected life of improvements.

For commercial property, energy performance can also interact with occupier requirements, regulatory expectations, marketability and investment decisions.

RICS's current commercial-property work recognises ESG and sustainability information as increasingly relevant to asset performance, risk, marketability and long-term value.

Energy, Investment and Valuation

Energy considerations can also become relevant to professional valuation where they influence the market.

RICS's ESG and sustainability in commercial property valuation, 4th edition, effective from 30 April 2026, provides a framework for considering significant sustainability and ESG factors in commercial-property valuation, including relevant costs, efficiencies and risks.

This does not mean that better energy performance automatically creates a particular increase in value. Its significance depends upon the property, market evidence and circumstances of the valuation.

RICS - ESG and sustainability in commercial property valuation

Decarbonisation and Asset Strategy

For property owners and investors, improving energy performance increasingly forms part of longer-term asset planning.

A decarbonisation strategy can consider the present performance of an asset, potential improvements, their timing and cost, and how these relate to refurbishment cycles and other planned expenditure.

RICS has highlighted the growing role of decarbonisation audits in commercial real-estate asset management and capital-expenditure planning. These can bring together operational and embodied emissions, energy use and other aspects of sustainability performance.

RICS – Towards standardising decarbonisation audits in real estate

Renewable Energy

Once energy demand and efficiency have been considered, renewable technologies can form part of a wider property energy strategy.

Depending upon the property and circumstances, this might include solar photovoltaic systems, heat pumps or other low-carbon technologies.

The suitability of individual technologies depends upon the building, location, energy demand, infrastructure, costs and wider project objectives.

This connects property energy management with the separate Renewable Energy work explored by

Sustain Surveying.

Energy, Resilience and the Future of Property

The energy system itself is changing.

Electrification, renewable generation, energy storage, digital building controls and changing patterns of energy demand are influencing the way buildings are designed, managed and valued.

At the same time, climate change may alter heating and cooling requirements, while changes in energy prices and regulation can create additional financial and operational risks.

Sustainable property therefore requires consideration not simply of how much energy a building uses today, but of how effectively it can adapt to future energy and environmental conditions.

Sustain Surveying and Energy

Sustain Surveying provides independent professional analysis and advice on energy and sustainability considerations affecting property and the built environment.

Our approach brings together surveying expertise, sustainability research, RICS standards and guidance, policy and wider professional evidence to help clients understand energy-related issues affecting a particular property, project, portfolio or organisation.

Advice may include review and interpretation of available energy and sustainability information; identification of energy-performance considerations; consideration of energy efficiency, retrofit and decarbonisation opportunities; relationships between energy, carbon, cost and asset performance; and interpretation of relevant professional standards, policy and emerging practice.

Where an instruction requires a formal energy assessment, EPC, detailed energy modelling, building-services design, retrofit design or another specialist technical service, the need for appropriately qualified and accredited professional input will be identified.

Discuss a Property Energy Issue

If you would like to discuss energy or decarbonisation considerations affecting a property, refurbishment, investment decision or property portfolio, please contact Sustain Surveying.

Professional advice can be provided for a defined project or instruction, with the scope and fee agreed in advance.