1999 Commercial Buildings Characteristics--CBECS Building Types

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Description of CBECS Building Types

In the Commercial Buildings Energy Consumption Survey (CBECS), buildings are classified according to principal activity, which is the primary business, commerce, or function carried on within each building. Buildings used for more than one of the activities described below are assigned to the activity occupying the most floorspace at the time of the interview. Thus, a building assigned to a particular principal activity category may be used for other activities in a portion of its space or at some time during the year.

In the 1999 CBECS, respondents were asked to place their building into a sub-category that was a more specific activity than has been collected in prior surveys. This was done to ensure the quality of the data; after data collection, the sub-categories were combined into the more general categories that are found in the detailed tables. These categories are consistent with prior years.

Category in Detailed Tables	Includes These Sub-Categories from 1999 Questionnaire	Other Information
Education	preschool or daycare elementary, middle or high school college or university	Includes only buildings used for academic or technical classroom instruction. Buildings on education campuses for which the main use is not classroom are included in the category relating to their use. For example, administration buildings are part of "Office," dormitories are "Lodging," and libraries are "Public Assembly."
Food Sales	grocery store or food market convenience store
Food Service	restaurant, bar, fast food chain, or cafeteria
Health Care (Inpatient)	hospital or other inpatient health care mental health institution inpatient rehabilitation
Health Care (Outpatient)	clinic or other outpatient health care building doctor's or dentist's office (see next column) outpatient rehabilitation veterinarian's office	Doctor's or dentist's office were placed into two different categories depending on whether or not they had specialized equipment for medical diagnosis or treatment; if this equipment is present, the building is considered "Outpatient Health Care," if it is not present, the building is "Office."
Lodging	hotel motel, inn, or resort retirement home shelter, orphanage, or children's home convent or monastery dormitory, fraternity, or sorority half-way house
Mercantile (Retail Other Than Mall)	freestanding store such as a department, furniture, clothing, hardware, drugstore, or bookstore car dealership or showroom alcoholic beverage store store that rents items such as videos, equipment, or vehicles
Mercantile (Enclosed and Strip Malls)	enclosed mall strip shopping center
Office	administrative or professional office bank or other financial institution government office doctor's or dentist's office (see next column) research and development building	Doctor's or dentist's office were placed into two different categories depending on whether or not they had specialized equipment for medical diagnosis or treatment; if this equipment is present, the building is considered "Outpatient Health Care," if it is not present, the building is "Office."
Public Assembly	theater, cinema, sports arena, casino, or night club gymnasium, health club, bowling alley, or other recreational sports facility social meeting center, meeting hall, or convention center library or museum transportation terminal funeral home broadcasting studio
Public Order and Safety	jail, reformatory, or penitentiary courthouse or probation office fire or police station
Religious Worship		Includes buildings such as chapels, churches, mosques, synagogues, and temples.
Service	auto service or auto repair shop beauty parlor or barber shop car wash copy center dry cleaner or laundromat gas station gas station with convenience store kennel photo processing shop post office or postal center repair shop
Warehouse and Storage	refrigerated non-refrigerated warehouse	Includes distribution centers. "Refrigerated" refers to buildings specifically designed to store perishable goods or merchandise under refrigeration. Includes “cold storage” facilities, which store products at temperatures between 0 degrees Fahrenheit and 50 degrees Fahrenheit and “freezer” facilities, which store products at temperatures between 0 degrees Fahrenheit and 20 degrees Fahrenheit.
Other	laboratory airplane hangar crematorium agricultural with some retail space manufacturing or industrial with some retail space	Also includes buildings identified as having several commercial activities that, together, represent 50 percent or more of the floorspace, but whose largest single activity is agricultural, industrial/manufacturing, or residential.
Vacant		Refers to commercial buildings in which more floorspace was vacant than was used for any single commercial activity at the time of interview. Therefore, a vacant building may have some occupied floorspace.

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1999 CBECS—Commercial Buildings Characteristics

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Release date: May 21, 2002

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