DC moved every BEPS deadline a year — and added a hardship exemption
DC moved every BEPS deadline a year — and added a hardship exemption
2026-09-09 · District of Columbia · Compliance
Every District of Columbia condominium and cooperative building large enough to be covered by Building Energy Performance Standards got an extra year, a later annual filing date, and — for the first time — a way out on hardship grounds. The Building Energy Performance Standards Amendment Act of 2024 took effect on March 21, 2025.1
BEPS is the largest single compliance burden District law places on multifamily buildings, and it is enforced by a payment measured against the whole building's square footage. A year is not a detail.
What the measure does
The benchmarking deadline moved to May 1. Amending D.C. Code § 6-1451.03(c)(2), the Act shifts the annual energy and water benchmarking report from April 1 to May 1. Third-party verification frequency changes from every three years to “In 2024, 2027, and every 6 years thereafter.”
The compliance cycles slid a year. Amending § 8-1772.21, the second BEPS cycle moves from January 1, 2027 to January 1, 2028, and the third from January 1, 2033 to January 1, 2034. The cycle that began January 1, 2021 gets six years to comply rather than five, the Act stating that this “include[s] a one-year delay of compliance due to the COVID-19 public health emergency.”
A new whole-cycle exemption. A new § 8-1772.21(e)(1A) allows an exemption where the owner demonstrates “financial distress, [or that] the qualifying building was below sufficient occupancy thresholds for either of the 2 years preceding the compliance cycle.”
“Penalties” became “payments.” Alternative compliance penalties are renamed alternative compliance payments, and DOEE is authorized to write rules letting owners recover all or part of a payment from their non-residential tenants.
Who this reaches, and when
The first cycle covers privately owned buildings of 50,000 square feet or more; the second pulls in buildings above 25,000 square feet. For a residential condominium or cooperative, the applicable standard is the multifamily-housing target — an ENERGY STAR score of 66, or a source energy use intensity of 110.7 — set from 2019 benchmarking data at the local median for the property type.2
Cycle 1 runs January 1, 2021 through December 31, 2026. Retrofits were to be complete by December 31, 2025; the Completed Actions Report is due April 1, 2027, and final energy data with third-party verification by May 1, 2027. DOEE begins assessing Cycle 1 outcomes in 2027.
What it changes for boards and managers
The non-residential cost-recovery carve-out is the sentence for residential boards. DOEE's rulemaking authority to let owners pass an alternative compliance payment through is expressly limited to non-residential tenants. A residential condominium has none. So for a DC condominium or housing cooperative, the payment is a common expense — funded by assessment or by reserves, allocated the way the condominium instruments allocate common expenses, and not separately chargeable to unit owners as a distinct fee.
The extra year is capital-planning time, and it is nearly spent. Cycle 1 ends December 31, 2026. A board that heard “BEPS was delayed” in 2025 and pushed its envelope or mechanical project past this budget year has roughly one quarter of usable runway left, and the two filings that follow are in spring 2027.
The hardship exemption has to be built, not claimed. “Financial distress” is not defined in the statute. An association that may need it should be assembling the record now — audited financials, the reserve study, the assessment history, delinquency rates, any special assessment already levied — rather than assembling it in response to a notice. The occupancy limb is narrower and more mechanical: below sufficient occupancy thresholds in either of the two years preceding the cycle.
Recalibrate the compliance calendar to May 1. Managers running portfolios across jurisdictions tend to carry an April 1 date for DC because that is what it was for a decade. It is May 1, by statute, and third-party verification falls due in 2027 under the new six-year rhythm.
What the Council did not do
Worth stating plainly, because a rumour circulated the other way in 2025. Draft versions of the FY2026 Budget Support Act would have delayed BEPS deadlines further and loosened related clean-energy requirements. Those delay provisions were removed before passage. Nothing in the FY2026 budget moved a BEPS date. A board that deferred work on the strength of that reporting deferred it on a mistake.
What to watch next
Three dates and one document.
December 31, 2026 closes Cycle 1. April 1, 2027 is the Completed Actions Report. May 1, 2027 is final data plus third-party verification. And DOEE's Compliance and Enforcement Guidebook is the operative document for how relief and remedies actually work — it was revised in August 2026, and a further “Good Faith Effort” framework is expected before the end of the year. Those developments are covered separately in our report on the revised Guidebook.
Then January 1, 2028, when buildings above 25,000 square feet enter the program. A great many DC condominium buildings sit in that band and have never been subject to a performance standard.
Related District of Columbia HOA Topics
Stay on top of District of Columbia HOA law
Every week: new District of Columbia legislation, court rulings, and regulatory developments affecting condos, planned communities, and property managers. Free.
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.