Preliminary estimates from the 1999 Commercial Buildings Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS) indicate that there were 4.6 million commercial buildings in the United States in 1999, comprising 67.2 billion square feet of floorspace. The survey calculates the number of commercial buildings and square footage in four areas of the United States: Northeast, Midwest, South and West. The South led the nation in the number of commercial buildings (1.7 million) and square footage (23.4 billion sq.ft.).
However, on average, the buildings in the South were relatively small, averaging about 13.4 thousand square feet per building. Although there were fewer commercial buildings in the Northeast, these buildings tended to be larger.
While office buildings were the most prevalent type of commercial buildings nationwide, they were relatively small in size compared to other building types such as lodging, education, and health care. Office buildings averaged about 16.3 thousand square feet per building while lodging, education, and health care buildings averaged about 29.6, 26.8, and 23.2 thousand square feet per building, respectively. Additional building characteristics from the 1999 CBECS will be released in the spring of 2001.
