Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 (England and Wales): geographical annex
Source: environment.data.gov.uk (2025-08-21)

Non-domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework (ND-NEED). The National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework was set up to provide a better understanding of energy use and intensity in domestic and non-domestic buildings.

These documents provide data on non-domestic energy use.

Responsible statistician: James Hemingway
Media enquiries: xx-xxxx-xxxx
Email: xxx@xxx.xx
Statistical enquiries: xx-xxxx-xxxx
The Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework
2023 (England and Wales) Geographical Annex
22 February 2024
Official Statistics

This report summarises analysis of the geographical differences in the non-domestic building
stock and non-domestic building energy consumption in England and Wales using the latest
version of the Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework (ND-NEED)
published in August 2023.
The key results are:
• Electricity and gas consumption from ND-NEED non-domestic buildings varies substantially
between regions in England and Wales.
o The North West consumed the most electricity in 2021, more than three times as
much as the North East which consumed the least.

o The North West consumed the most gas in 2021, three times as much as the North
East which consumed the least.
• The proportion of electricity and gas consumption from ND-NEED non-domestic buildings in
a particular type of building varies between regions in England and Wales.
o London is responsible for 34% of electricity consumption from offices, while the
North East is responsible for just 3%.
o Yorkshire and The Humber is responsible for 26% of gas consumption from
factories, while the North East is responsible for just 4%.

• The proportion of factories, offices, shops, or warehouses in a region is broadly similar to
the proportion of all non-domestic buildings in that region.
o The key exception to this is London which contains 14% of non-domestic buildings in
England and Wales, but 21% of offices and 9% of factories.
• There are 270,300 off-gas grid ND-NEED non-domestic buildings in England and 24,100 in
Wales, 17% of the ND-NEED non-domestic building stock.
• This year we have expanded analysis of off-gas grid buildings by splitting data on the
number of off-gas grid non-domestic buildings by region and building use.
o Broadly, the proportions of all non-domestic buildings that are off-gas grid by building
type mirror that for all buildings, with offices accounting for the highest proportion
(19%), closely followed by hospitality buildings.

Responsible statistician: James Hemingway
Media enquiries: xx-xxxx-xxxx
Email: xxx@xxx.xx
Statistical enquiries: xx-xxxx-xxxx
o The South West and East regions have the highest shares of non-domestic buildings
laying off the gas grid (27% and 25% respectively), with London the lowest (10%). In
particular, 43% of hospitality buildings in the South West are off the gas grid.
What you need to know about these statistics:

The statistics in ND-NEED cover all non-domestic buildings in England and Wales, under
the ND-NEED definition (see main ND-NEED 2023 report for detail).

Information on the non-domestic building stock (building number, building use, building
size, off-gas grid) reflects the position at the end of March 2023.

Information on energy consumption is presented for 2021, and comprises electricity and
gas consumed via the public distribution system (onsite generated electricity, oil, LPG
and biomass consumption are not included).

All geographic maps and associated data are split using the administrative boundaries in
England and Wales for 2023.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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Contents
1. Introduction _____________________________________________________________ 4
What questions can be answered by ND-NEED Geographical Annex? ________________ 5
What questions cannot be answered by ND-NEED Geographical Annex? _____________ 6
2. Changes since the ND-NEED 2020 Geographical Annex __________________________ 7
3. Results _________________________________________________________________ 9
England and Wales ND-NEED non-domestic building stock _______________________ 10
Number of non-domestic buildings by region _________________________________ 10
Number of non-domestic buildings by region, building use and building size _________ 12
Number of non-domestic buildings by local authority (LA) _______________________ 14
Number of non-domestic buildings by parliamentary constituency (PC) _____________ 18
Number of non-domestic off-gas grid buildings ________________________________ 20
Floor area of non-domestic buildings by region and building use __________________ 23
England and Wales non-domestic building energy consumption ____________________ 24
Non-domestic total consumption by region (ND-NEED meter level population) _______ 26
Non-domestic total consumption by region, split by building use (ND-NEED weighted
matched sample) ______________________________________________________ 28
4. Method ________________________________________________________________ 31
Creating the ND-NEED Geographical Annex Dataset ____________________________ 31
Missing floor area data in ND-NEED Geographical Annex dataset __________________ 36
Weighting the ND-NEED matched sample consumption dataset ____________________ 38
Creating the Geographical ND-NEED meter dataset _____________________________ 41
Comparing the measures of non-domestic consumption __________________________ 42
Validating the regional breakdown of ND-NEED weighted matched sample consumption
data against ND-NEED meter level consumption data __________________________ 43
Creating Geographical ND-NEED maps _______________________________________ 45
5.Further information _______________________________________________________ 47
Accompanying tables _____________________________________________________ 47
Future updates to these statistics ____________________________________________ 48
Related statistics ________________________________________________________ 48
Revisions policy _________________________________________________________ 49
Code of Practice for Statistics compliance _____________________________________ 49
User engagement ________________________________________________________ 49
Contact ________________________________________________________________ 49

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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1. Introduction
The Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework (ND-NEED) 2023
Geographical Annex (Geographical ND-NEED) provides additional geographical insight into
the ND-NEED 2023 publication.
It provides information and analysis into the differences in electricity and gas consumption of
non-domestic buildings within England and Wales in 2021 by region, local authority (LA) and
parliamentary constituency (PC).
Additionally, it provides information and analysis into the differences in the non-domestic
building stock – under the ND-NEED definition - within England and Wales in 2023 by region,
LA and PC. Further splits are provided for ND-NEED building uses, building sizes and for non-
domestic buildings in areas that have no buildings connected to the gas distribution network
(off-gas grid buildings). This is summarised in Table 1.
Table 1: Summary of the data presented in the Geographical ND-NEED annex

This is an annex to ND-NEED to provide information regarding geographical differences in
non-domestic building energy use and the non-domestic building stock within England and
Wales. It is intended that the data tables will be updated following the main ND-NEED
publication, the next update of which is planned for the summer of 2024.

Metric
Regional
Local Authority &
Parliamentary Constituency
Number of buildings
Building use

Larger than or smaller than or
equal to 1,000m2

Off-gas Grid – rural or urban

Building use

Off-gas Grid – rural or urban

Floor area
Aggregated building uses

Aggregated building uses
Electricity and gas
consumption
Total consumption (from meter
population)

Building use (from weighted
ND-NEED matched sample)

Total consumption (from meter
population)

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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The geographical ND-NEED annex used postcode information in the ND-NEED dataset and
geographical datasets from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to split the ND-NEED data
by geography. Data from Xoserve was used to identify buildings in postcodes that have no
buildings connected to the gas distribution network (off-gas grid buildings).
The datasets used in Geographical ND-NEED are:
1. The ND-NEED 2023 dataset1 of all non-domestic buildings in England and Wales
(under the ND-NEED definition) which includes information on building postcode,
building use, building size, and building energy consumption.

2. The ONS National Statistical Postcode Lookup (NSPL)2 which relates postcodes in the
UK to ONS area codes (region, LA, PC). This also includes information on whether a
postcode is in a rural or urban area.

3. The ONS Names and Codes lookup tables3 which relates the names of geographical
areas to ONS area codes used in the NSPL.

4. The ONS Boundary shapefiles4 which contain the boundary shape of UK LAs and PCs.
This is used to produce maps of the geographical data.

5. Xoserve off-gas grid data5. This lists postcodes in Great Britain in which there are no
buildings, domestic or non-domestic, connected to the national gas grid.
The 1,763,000 non-domestic buildings in the ND-NEED dataset were matched by postcode to
the ONS NSPL, with a 99.6% match rate. This allowed the region, LA and PC codes of the
1,756,000 matched non-domestic buildings to be identified. More information about this
matching process can be found in the method section.
The ONS Names and Codes lookup tables were used to obtain the area names corresponding
to these codes and the ONS Boundary shapes files were used to obtain the shape of these
areas so geographical maps could be created.
The postcodes in the ND-NEED dataset were also matched to the Xoserve off-gas grid dataset
and a flag was created for non-domestic buildings in postcodes where no buildings, domestic
or non-domestic, are connected to the national gas grid.
What questions can be answered by ND-NEED Geographical
Annex?
• How many non-domestic buildings were there in a particular geographical area (region,
LA, PC) in England and Wales in 2023, split by building use?

• How much non-domestic building floor area was there in a particular geographical area
(region, LA, PC) in England and Wales in 2023, split by building use?

1 ND-NEED 2023
2 ONS NSPL
3 ONS LA Names and Codes and ONS PC Names and Codes
4 ONS LA Boundaries and ONS PC Boundaries
5 Xoserve data

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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• How many non-domestic buildings were there in a particular geographical area (region,
LA, PC) in England and Wales in 2023 that were off the gas grid?

• How did the non-domestic electricity/gas consumption vary by geographical area
(region, LA, PC) of England and Wales in 2021?

• How did the non-domestic electricity/gas consumption/intensity vary by region of
England and Wales in 2021, split by building use?
What questions cannot be answered by ND-NEED
Geographical Annex?
• What are the variations in characteristics or energy consumption of the non-domestic
building stock across Scotland and Northern Ireland?

• How much of other fuels (e.g. biomass/LPG/oil) do non-domestic buildings consume in
each geographical area?

• How has the non-domestic building stock or consumption changed over time?
Currently, only the latest year is presented here, providing a snapshot. For building
stock figures, comparison may be made with the previous publication. However, two
caveats should be noted:

a. The previous snapshot was three years prior, so any growth should be
considered over that time.
b. ND-NEED building stock is produced on a Unique Property Reference
Number (UPRN) basis. Not every building is allocated a UPRN, however, the
allocation rate may improve over time, so a small percentage of any change
between the years may be due to this. As an example, in the main ND-NEED
2023, around 1% of the building stock in 2023 were buildings that existed
previously but had only been allocated UPRNs in the latest edition.6
For consumption data, it is not recommended to make comparison between the 2021
data presented here, and the 2018 data presented in the previous edition, for the
following reasons:
a. The underlying meter point consumption data for 2018 (and subsequent
years) has been revised subsequently – this resulted in notably large
revisions to the West Midlands and East regions gas consumption data. 7
b. The matched sample consumption data presented relates to the building
stock at that time, rather than the latest one.

To analyse consumption, by building use or size, over time, it is recommended that
users refer to the main ND-NEED 2023 publication, which presents a complete time-
series of this, but for England and Wales only. Alternatively, a time-series of non-
domestic electricity and gas consumption, by local authorities and regions, can be found
in the sub-national electricity and gas consumption statistics; however, no further

6 See the ND-NEED 2023 methodology note (pages 1, 14-15) for more details on this.
7 Further information in the subnational consumption statistics: methodology and guidance (page 15)

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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disaggregation by building use or size is presented in these. Table 14 in the method
section presents the other key differences between that data, and the data presented
here.

• How does non-domestic building characteristics or energy use differ in each
geographical area between:
•
Rented or owner-occupied buildings?
•
Public or private buildings?
•
Buildings occupied by small, medium, or large businesses?
2. Changes since the ND-NEED 2020
Geographical Annex
The ND-NEED Geographical Annex was last published in March 2021 (consistent with ND-
NEED 2020). Since then, there have been some changes to the methodology.

The key changes are listed below – the first two of these are data updates to align with the
latest ND-NEED publication, the third is a data update specific to the geographical annex
publication, while the fourth and fifth are changes to the accompanying data tables:

1. Updated building stock data. This now covers the stock as of March 2023 (March 2020
previously). This is used as the basis for creating the ND-NEED sample (where
electricity and gas consumption data are matched to the building stock), and therefore
impacts on the consumption data presented. More information on the building stock
update can be found in the ND-NEED methodology note (page 4).

2. Updated electricity and gas meter consumption data. This now covers 2021 (from 2018
previously).

3. Updated look up and boundary files. The report uses updated boundary and lookup
files. The main update is to the Local Authority (LA) breakdowns, which now take on the
April 2023 structure. The regions affected by this change are:
a. East Midlands which now has 35 LAs in comparison to 40 in the 2020
Geographical Annex.
b. North West which now has 35 LAs in comparison to 39 previously.
c. Yorkshire and the Humber which now has 15 in comparison to 21 previously.
d. South West which now has 27 in comparison to 30 previously.

Further details of these changes can be found in table 9.

4. Expanded off-gas grid building analysis: Table 3B in the accompanying data tables is a
new table which shows the number of off-gas grid ND-NEED non-domestic buildings,
split by both region and building use. For more information, see number of non-domestic
off-gas grid buildings.

5. All data tables have been renamed into a numbered format to improve accessibility and
where possible, region and local authority data tables have been merged:

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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Previous Table
New Table
RG1 and LA1
Table 1
RG4 and LA2
Table 2
RG5 and LA3
Table 3A
RG6 and LA4
Table 4

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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3. Results
The following data is presented in the data tables accompanying this publication. An asterisk
(*) indicates that this data is also presented in this report for further analysis.

Table
Region
Local
Authority
Parliamentary
constituency
Table 1: the number of ND-NEED non-domestic
buildings, by building use*
X
X

Table 2: the floor area of ND-NEED non-domestic
buildings, by building use*
X
X

Table 3A: the number of ND-NEED non-domestic
off-gas grid buildings, by rural and urban
X
X

Table 3B: the number of off-gas grid ND-NEED
non-domestic buildings, by building use
X

Table 4: the energy consumption from ND-NEED
meters*
X
X

Table 5: the ND-NEED number of non-domestic
buildings larger than 1,000m2, by building use*
X

Table 6: the ND-NEED number of non-domestic
buildings smaller than or equal to 1,000m2, by
building use*
X

Table 7A: the scaled ND-NEED non-domestic
electricity consumption, by building use*
X

Table 7B: the scaled ND-NEED non-domestic gas
consumption, by building use*
X

Table 8: the number of ND-NEED non-domestic
buildings, by building use*

X
Table 9: the floor area of ND-NEED non-domestic
buildings, by building use

X
Table 10: the number of off-gas grid ND-NEED
non-domestic buildings, by rural and urban*

X
Table 11: the energy consumption from ND-
NEED meters, by electricity and gas

X

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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England and Wales ND-NEED non-domestic building stock
Under the ND-NEED definition, there were 1,763,000 non-domestic buildings in England and
Wales at the end of March 2023. Of these, 1,756,000 were successfully matched to a location
in England and Wales, and 6,000 non-domestic buildings failed to match to a location due to
the postcode not being present in the NSPL. More information about this matching process can
be found in the Method section.
The ND-NEED definition covers all non-domestic buildings included in the Valuation
Office Agency (VOA)’s non-domestic ratings list (NDR)8, excluding premises that are not
considered to be buildings for ND-NEED purposes. These are caravan parks, advertising
premises, car parks, beach huts, quarries, and telecoms units. For more information on
non-buildings, see page 23 of ND-NEED Methodology Note 2023.

Note, in the NDR the data is at the hereditament9 (Unique Address Reference Number
(UARN)) level. In ND-NEED it is aggregated to the building (Unique Property Reference
Number (UPRN)) level.

Number of non-domestic buildings by region
The number of ND buildings can be presented for each region of England and Wales. This is
displayed as a heatmap in Figure 1. The corresponding data can be found in Table 1 in the
accompanying data tables.
Note, as it is common for most areas to have values closer to the median than the
outliers, all heat maps use a log scale to improve clarity by better highlighting differences.
Darker blues indicate a comparatively higher number of non-domestic buildings, and
lighter yellows indicate a comparatively lower number of non-domestic buildings.

From Figure 1 we can see that the regions with the highest number of non-domestic buildings
are London and the South East, while the North East and Wales have the lowest number of
non-domestic buildings. This variation in non-domestic building number between regions is
broadly consistent with the variation in population. London and the South East have the
highest populations, whilst the North East and Wales have the lowest populations (ONS,
2021)10. This suggests that there is a strong correlation between the number of people that live
in a particular area and the number of non-domestic buildings it contains.

8 Non-domestic rating 2023
9 A hereditament is a rateable property for the purpose of business rates.
10 Data from ONS population estimates

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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Figure 1: Number of non-domestic buildings by region in England and Wales

Number of non-domestic buildings by region and building use
The number of non-domestic buildings by region can also be disaggregated by building use.
This can be seen in Table 2 for the four non-domestic building uses with the highest number of
buildings (factories; offices; shops; and warehouses). Information about the other ND-NEED
building uses (arts, community, and leisure; education; emergency services; health; hospitality;
and other) can be found in Table 1 in the accompanying data tables.
Table 2 shows that the proportion of factories, offices, shops and warehouses in a region are
all broadly in line with the proportion of all non-domestic buildings in that region. The one
notable exception is London. London has a disproportionately high number of offices (21% of
all offices in England and Wales) compared to the 14% of all non-domestic buildings that are in

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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London. London also has a disproportionately low number of factories and warehouses (9% of
those in England and Wales compared to 14% for all non-domestic buildings that are in
London).
Table 2: The proportion of factories, offices, shops and warehouses in England and
Wales that are in each region11
Region
Factories
Offices
Shops
Warehouses All Building
Uses
England
94%
95%
94%
94%
94%
North East
5%
4%
5%
3%
4%
North West
12%
12%
14%
14%
13%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
11%
10%
10%
11%
10%
East Midlands
10%
7%
7%
8%
8%
West Midlands
11%
8%
10%
11%
9%
East
11%
9%
9%
12%
10%
London
9%
21%
18%
9%
14%
South East
14%
15%
13%
15%
14%
South West
12%
9%
9%
12%
11%
Wales
6%
5%
6%
6%
6%
Total
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%

Number of non-domestic buildings by region, building use and building size
The number of non-domestic buildings by region and building use can also be disaggregated
further, by building size. This analysis excludes the 19% (329,000) of non-domestic buildings in
the ND-NEED Geographical Annex dataset that are missing floor area data. More information
about why these buildings are missing floor area data can be found in the Method section.
The proportion of buildings that are missing floor area information varies substantially between
building uses, from 96% missing from emergency services buildings, to only 2% missing from
factory buildings. Because of this, building use splits are only presented for the four that have
over 80% of floor area present (factories, offices, shops, and warehouses).

11 These four building uses are presented here as they are the four largest ND-NEED building uses by building
number and because they align with the floor area figures presented later in the report.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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Table 3 contains the proportion of all non-domestic buildings larger than 1,000m2 12 in England
and Wales in each region, split by building use.
In general, the proportion of factories, offices, shops, and warehouses in a region are all similar
to the proportion of all non-domestic buildings in that region. This is the same pattern as was
seen for all non-domestic buildings in Table 2.
As in Table 2, the exception to this is London. London contains 10% of large non-domestic
buildings in England and Wales, but 27% of offices larger than 1,000m2. This is more than the
21% of all offices that are located in London. This could be because companies often locate
their headquarters in London, which are likely to be larger than offices in other areas. London
also contains 3% of factories larger than 1,000m2 (compared to 10% of all large non-domestic
buildings that are in London).
Table 3: Proportion of non-domestic buildings larger than 1,000m2 in England and Wales
that are in each region, by key building uses

Region
Factories
Offices
Shops
Warehouses
All Building
uses
England
93%
96%
94%
95%
95%
North East
6%
4%
5%
4%
5%
North West
14%
12%
14%
14%
14%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
14%
8%
10%
12%
12%
East Midlands
12%
6%
8%
10%
10%
West Midlands
15%
8%
11%
12%
12%
East
10%
9%
11%
12%
11%
London
3%
27%
11%
8%
10%
South East
11%
16%
14%
14%
13%
South West
9%
7%
10%
9%
9%
Wales
7%
4%
6%
5%
5%
Total
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%

12 This threshold has been chosen as it is an important threshold for non-domestic building decarbonisation policy.
For example the performance-based policy framework.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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Table 4 contains the proportion of non-domestic buildings smaller than or equal to 1,000m2
that are in each region in England and Wales, split by building use.
Again, the proportions by region in each building use are generally in line with the proportion of
all non-domestic buildings smaller than or equal to 1,000m2 in the region. London is still an
exception, but this difference is less than for all non-domestic buildings or for non-domestic
buildings larger than 1,000m2.
Table 4: Proportion of non-domestic buildings smaller than or equal to 1,000m2 in
England and Wales that are in each region, by key building uses

Region
Factories
Offices
Shops
Warehouses
All Building
uses
England
94%
95%
94%
94%
94%
North East
5%
4%
5%
3%
4%
North West
11%
12%
14%
14%
13%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
11%
10%
10%
10%
10%
East Midlands
10%
7%
7%
8%
8%
West Midlands
11%
9%
10%
11%
10%
East
11%
10%
8%
12%
10%
London
9%
20%
18%
9%
15%
South East
14%
15%
13%
15%
14%
South West
12%
9%
9%
12%
10%
Wales
6%
5%
6%
6%
6%
Total
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%

Number of non-domestic buildings by local authority (LA)
The number of non-domestic buildings in each LA was also calculated. This is presented as a
heatmap in Figure 2. The corresponding data can be found in Table 1 in the accompanying
data tables.
Cornwall has the highest number of non-domestic buildings with 33,000. LAs covering major
cities including Birmingham, Leeds, Bradford, Sheffield and Manchester are all in the top 10,
with 15,000 non-domestic buildings or higher. Westminster in London is fourth highest with
27,000 non-domestic buildings.
The Isles of Scilly have the lowest number of non-domestic buildings at 490. All other LAs have
more than 1,000 non-domestic buildings.

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Figure 2: Number of non-domestic buildings by LA in England and Wales

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
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Note, there are large variations in the population of local authorities. For example, the
Metropolitan District of Birmingham has a population of 1,140,000, whilst the Isles of
Scilly has a population of 2,300 (ONS, 2021).
As there is a correlation between the population of a local authority and the number of
non-domestic buildings it contains (see Figure 3), population differences should be
considered when interpreting results at the local authority level.
To help with this the number of buildings in a local authority per 100,000 population is
also presented in the data tables (see Table 1 in the accompanying data tables).
The number of non-domestic buildings in each parliamentary constituency is also
presented in this report below. Parliamentary constituencies have broadly similar
populations, so patterns seen will not be driven by population differences.
From Figure 3 we can see that there is a correlation between the population of the local
authority and the number of non-domestic buildings it contains, which at least partly explains
the results described above. There are however two prominent outliers: both Cornwall and
Westminster have a much higher number of non-domestic buildings than would be expected
based on their population.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
17

Figure 3: Variation of the number of non-domestic buildings with population for LA in
England and WalesError! Bookmark not defined.
In Cornwall this could be due to the relatively high number of tourists; 19 million overnight trips
were spent in Cornwall per year on average between 2021 and 2023, 6% of England’s total13.
Tourists increase the demand for hospitality buildings, but will not be counted in the population
estimates, increasing the number of non-domestic buildings per 100,000 population. The
demand for hospitality buildings in Cornwall can been seen in Table 1 (in the accompanying
data tables). At over 13,000, Cornwall has one-third of the hospitality buildings in the South-
West, and the most hospitality buildings in England and Wales (6.9% of hospitality buildings in
England and Wales). However, Cornwall has only 1.9% of all non-domestic buildings in
England and Wales.
The 13,000 hospitality buildings in Cornwall represents an increase of 34% - over three years -
on the figure presented in the 2020 geographical annex, largely due to an increase in holiday
homes (which may have been repurposed from domestic use). All regions – except for London
- have seen increases of between 15% and 30% in hospitality buildings, with holiday homes
the main contributor in each case.
In Westminster, the high number of non-domestic buildings, compared with the population,
could be due to the disproportionately high number of office buildings in this area. Westminster
contains the largest share (4.7%) of all offices in England and Wales, but only 1.6% of all non-
domestic buildings. Many of the workers in these offices will not live in the local area but will
commute from elsewhere, and so will not be included in the population estimates. The high
number of offices in the area will also drive demand for other non-domestic buildings such as
hospitality buildings, to cater for the workforce.
Whilst the overall number of offices in England and Wales has increased by 7% since the last
update in the 2020 geographical annex, in London this increase has been lower (4.3%).
Meanwhile, Westminster was one of 11 London local authorities to have seen a reduction in
the number of offices, falling by 4%, from 17,250 to 16,560 buildings, possibly due to changing
working patterns since the Covid-19 pandemic. 14
Adjusting for population, the City of London, the Isles of Scilly and Westminster have the most
non-domestic buildings of any LA (40,000, 21,000 and 13,000 non-domestic buildings per
100,000 population respectively). Bracknell Forest in the South East has the lowest rate, at
1,000 non-domestic buildings per 100,000 population. Bracknell Forest also has the fourth
lowest number of non-domestic buildings of any LA in England and Wales at 1,300. Of the 10
LAs with the lowest number of non-domestic buildings per 100,000 population, six are in the
South East and outer London areas.

13 Visit Britain Local Authority Data
14 Is hybrid working here to stay?

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
18

Number of non-domestic buildings by parliamentary constituency (PC)
Figure 4 shows the number of non-domestic buildings in each PC. The corresponding data can
be found in Table 8 in the accompanying data tables.
PC boundaries are drawn so that they contain voting populations of broadly the same
size (House of Commons, 2023)15. Because of this, data presented at PC level will be
relatively unaffected by variations in population.

The PC of the Cities of London and Westminster has the highest number of non-domestic
buildings in England and Wales, with 28,000 non-domestic buildings or 1.6% of the non-
domestic buildings in England and Wales.
The PC of Holborn and St Pancras in London has the second highest number of non-domestic
buildings, with constituencies in Birmingham, central Leeds, Manchester, Bristol, Westmorland
and Lonsdale, and Sheffield joining two other London constituencies to complete the ten PCs
with the most non-domestic buildings. This suggests that as PCs in the centre of large cities
tend to have the highest number of non-domestic buildings, perhaps city centres tend to have
few domestic properties and densely packed non-domestic properties.
The PCs with the lowest number of non-domestic buildings are also in urban areas but tend to
be located towards the outskirts of towns and cities, rather than in the centre. For example,
Sheffield Hallam has the fewest non-domestic buildings (900), while Luton North is the only
other PC with less than 1,000 non-domestic buildings. This could be because suburban areas
towards the edge of large cities/towns have a higher proportion of domestic buildings and
fewer non-domestic ones.

15 House of Commons Research Briefing on PC boundaries

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
19

Figure 4: Number of non-domestic buildings by PC in England and Wales

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
20

Number of non-domestic off-gas grid buildings
Further analysis has been undertaken to identify the geographical distribution of the non-
domestic buildings in England and Wales that are off the gas grid. Full results at PC, LA and
regional level can be found in the accompanying data tables (Table 3A, Table 3B and Table
10).
Buildings in the ND-NEED Geographical Annex were identified as either ‘on-gas grid’, or ‘off-
gas grid’, using Xoserve data containing postcodes with no connections to the national gas grid
(2023). More information on the classification of off-gas grid buildings is available in the
Method section.
The ND-NEED definition of an off-gas grid non-domestic building is a non-domestic
building in a postcode where no building, domestic or non-domestic, has a connection to
the gas distribution network.

This analysis shows that 17% (294,000) of non-domestic buildings in England and Wales are
off-gas grid. The proportion of buildings that are off-gas grid varies substantially between
regions from only 10% in London to 27% in the South West (see Table 3A in the
accompanying data tables).

Data is also available for the number of domestic properties that are not connected to the gas
grid16. Whilst this is on a slightly different basis from the method used for non-domestic
buildings (see Method section), the headline results are similar, with 15% of domestic
properties in Great Britain not connected to the gas grid17.
Number of off-gas grid buildings by parliamentary constituency
Analysis of the number of off-gas grid buildings by parliamentary constituency found that the
PCs with the highest proportion of off-gas grid non-domestic buildings were in the
predominantly rural South Norfolk (62%) and Newport East (59%). The PCs with the lowest
proportion of off-gas grid non-domestic buildings were in Mitcham and Morden, Tooting,
Birmingham Erdington, Birmingham Selly Oak and in Leicester East. All these PCs have less
than 0.01% of non-domestic buildings off-gas grid.
Rural/Urban split
As the PC level data indicates that there is a difference between the number of off-gas grid
buildings in rural and urban area, the data can be disaggregated further, using the ONS NSPL
rural-urban classification method. This showed that 186,000 off-gas grid non-domestic
buildings are located in rural areas (63%), and 108,000 off-gas grid non-domestic buildings are
located in urban areas (37%). The number of off-gas grid non-domestic buildings in each PC
that are urban or rural respectively are presented in Figure 5.
Note, the map in Figure 5 is at the PC level, whereas the urban/rural split is at the 2011
Census Output Areas level, which are much smaller than PCs. This means the majority of
PCs are coloured in both the urban and rural maps, as they contain both urban and rural
Output Areas.

16 Subnational estimates of properties not connected to the gas network
17 Subnational electricity and gas consumption summary report 2022

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
21

The PCs with the highest number of urban off-gas grid non-domestic buildings are in city
centres, including the Cities of London and Westminster (7,800), Manchester Central (1,900)
and Holborn and St Pancras (1,500). The PCs with the highest total number of rural off-gas
grid non-domestic buildings are in North Cornwall (4,000), St Ives (3,400) and North Norfolk
(2,800).
The top rural PCs have a higher number of off-gas grid buildings than the top urban PCs. As
urban PCs are likely to be more densely populated, this suggests that rural PCs tend to have
larger geographical areas that are off the gas grid than urban PCs. The higher number of off-
gas grid buildings in rural areas also ties in with the fact that 63% of all off-gas grid buildings
are in rural areas.
Figure 5: Number of off-gas grid buildings by PC in England and Wales, by rural and
urban

Figure 5a: Rural off-gas grid buildings
Figure 5b: Urban off-gas grid buildings
Note, In Figures, 5a and 5b, NA (shaded in grey) represents areas where there are no
rural or urban off-gas grid buildings, such as Dwyfor Meirionnydd in Wales in Figure 5b.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
22

Number of off-gas grid buildings by region and building use
This year we have expanded analysis on off-gas grid buildings through Table 3B in the
accompanying data tables, where data on the number of off-gas grid non-domestic buildings
by region and building use can be found.
Analysis of the number of off-gas grid buildings by building use found that offices have the
highest proportion of all off-gas grid non-domestic buildings (19%), closely followed by
hospitality buildings (19%). The building uses with the lowest proportion of all off-gas grid non-
domestic buildings were emergency services (0.1%), health (1%) and education (2%). These
proportions broadly follow a similar pattern to the proportion of each building type in England
and Wales The only exception to this pattern is hospitality buildings which only makes up 11%
of non-domestic buildings yet account for 19% of off-gas grid buildings.
The proportion of factories, offices, shops, and warehouses in each region are also generally in
line with the proportion of all non-domestic floor area in that region. Again, London is the
exception, with a disproportionately high share of offices off the gas grid (22%), and a
disproportionately low share of factories off the gas grid (4%), compared with 8% of all non-
domestic off-gas grid buildings.
Table 5 shows the number of off-gas grid non-domestic buildings as a proportion of all non-
domestic buildings of that building type by region18. The South West and East regions stand
out in particular with relatively higher shares of their building stock laying off the gas grid. The
South West has the highest proportion of off-gas grid buildings at 27%, particularly 43% of
hospitality buildings in the South West lay off the gas grid. This is closely followed by East
where 25% of its non-domestic buildings are off the gas grid, with around 35% of each of its
factories, warehouses and hospitality laying off the gas grid. Across all regions, shops have the
lowest proportion of buildings off the gas grid, ranging from 5 to 10%.

18 Alongside the other four building use categories that are included in previous tables, hospitality has been
included in table 5 due to its significance of off-gas grid buildings. It has the second highest number of off-gas grid
non-domestic buildings (after offices), and, besides the “other” category, the highest proportion of non-domestic
buildings laying off the gas grid.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
23

Table 5: Number of off-gas grid non-domestic buildings as a proportion of all non-
domestic buildings in each region in England and Wales, by building use

Floor area of non-domestic buildings by region and building use
Analysis has also been carried out to disaggregate non-domestic building floor area in England
and Wales by region, local authority and parliamentary constituency. Analysis of the results at
the regional level can be found below. Data at the local authority level can be found in Table 2
in the accompanying data tables, and at the parliamentary constituency level in Table 9.
Note, 329,000 (19%) of the 1,763,000 non-domestic buildings in the ND-NEED
Geographical Annex dataset do not have floor area information, and so are excluded
from this analysis.

The proportion of buildings missing floor area information varies slightly between regions,
ranging from 14% in London to 27% in the South West (see Table 11 in the Method
section). This may inflate the results from regions with a higher proportion of floor area
present and deflate the results from the regions with a lower proportion of floor area
present.

Table 6 shows the proportion of floor area of non-domestic buildings in each region in England
and Wales, split by building use. As with Tables 2 and 3, data are only presented for building
uses that have floor area for more than 80% of buildings.
Region
Factories
Hospitality
Offices
Shops
Warehouses
All
Building
uses
England
21%
26%
16%
6%
21%
16%
North East
15%
32%
12%
6%
18%
14%
North West
14%
19%
14%
5%
13%
12%
Yorkshire and
The Humber
14%
22%
12%
5%
15%
13%
East Midlands
18%
20%
15%
6%
19%
15%
West Midlands
18%
23%
14%
6%
18%
14%
East
35%
35%
21%
9%
34%
25%
London
9%
6%
17%
6%
9%
10%
South East
28%
18%
19%
7%
27%
18%
South West
33%
43%
19%
10%
31%
27%
Wales
25%
44%
14%
8%
19%
22%
England &
Wales
21%
28%
16%
6%
21%
17%

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
24

Table 6: Proportion of floor area of non-domestic buildings in each region in England
and Wales, by building use

Table 6 shows that floor area has a similar pattern to building numbers (see Table 2). The
proportion of factories, offices, shops, and warehouses in each region are all generally in line
with the proportion of all non-domestic floor area in that region. Again, London is the exception,
with a disproportionately high share of office floor area (27%), and a disproportionately low
share of factory floor area (4%), compared with 10% of non-domestic building floor area in
London.
England and Wales non-domestic building energy consumption
This section of the report analyses the distribution of non-domestic building electricity and gas
consumption, in England and Wales.
Two methods are used to produce this analysis. A brief outline of these methods are
summarised in Figure 6, and the implications this has on the resulting analysis is provided
below.
Please consider this when deciding which energy consumption method is most
appropriate for your work. More information and a comparison of the methods used,
including how these methods compare to the sub-national statistics19, and their impact on
the energy consumption analysis, can be found in the Method section.

19 Subnational electricity and gas consumption summary report 2022
Region
Factories
Offices
Shops
Warehouses
All Building
uses
England
93%
96%
94%
96%
95%
North East
6%
4%
5%
4%
5%
North West
14%
12%
14%
13%
13%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
14%
8%
10%
12%
12%
East Midlands
12%
6%
8%
13%
10%
West Midlands
14%
8%
10%
13%
12%
East
10%
8%
10%
12%
11%
London
4%
27%
14%
7%
10%
South East
10%
15%
14%
13%
13%
South West
9%
8%
10%
9%
9%
Wales
7%
4%
6%
4%
5%
Total
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
25

1. ND-NEED meter population total consumption
Consumption data by geographical area can be presented using the entire underlying ND-
NEED meter population. This is the meter level data of all non-domestic buildings in England
and Wales and is what the ND-NEED sample consumption data is scaled to (see the
methodology note of the main ND-NEED 2023).
The key advantage of this method is that all electricity and gas consumption from non-
domestic buildings is captured. This allows meaningful comparisons of consumption between
all geographical areas.
The key disadvantages of this method are that:
1. The data cannot be split by building use or building size. This is because these meters
have not been matched to their corresponding buildings, so the characteristics of the
buildings they are in are unknown.

2. The data includes consumption from ‘non-buildings’ that are excluded under the ND-
NEED definition, for example car parks or quarries. This adds an extra 10-15% to the
weighted matched sample consumption figures also presented here.
Due to the lack of a geographical component in the weighting method, this is the best
representation of the distribution of total electricity and gas consumption across region, local
authority or parliamentary constituency.
2. ND-NEED weighted matched sample consumption
Due to the limitations of the address-matching process, just over 50% of buildings in the ND-
NEED stock were successfully allocated 2021 electricity consumption meter data. This creates
a sample of 864,000 non-domestic buildings with 2021 electricity consumption data. Of these,
357,000 non-domestic buildings were also matched to 2021 gas consumption data.
As the sample of matched buildings is not representative of the entire building stock, ND-
NEED weights the sample to the population level. The weights scale a building in the matched
sample based on its use and size. Full details of the weighting process can be found in the
methodology note of ND-NEED 2023.
The key advantage of this method is that the consumption data can be split by building use
since the consumption data has been linked to the corresponding ND-NEED buildings.
The key disadvantage of this method is that the number of buildings missing electricity or gas
consumption information in the matched sample differs between geographical areas. This bias
in the matching process is not fully accounted for in the weighting process. Because of this
bias, data from the ND-NEED meter population method should be used when building use or
building size splits are not needed.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
26

Figure 6: Methods for calculating consumption of non-domestic consumption from ND-
NEED data

Non-domestic total consumption by region (ND-NEED meter level population)
As outlined above, this report presents consumption from the ND-NEED meter population, split
by region. The results of this analysis at regional level are summarised in Figure 7, while the
ND-NEED meter population consumption data at local authority and parliamentary
constituency level can be found in Tables 4 and 11 in the accompanying data tables.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
27

The ND-NEED meter population dataset (England and Wales) differs from the non-
domestic subnational dataset (GB) because it includes consumption from low-consuming
‘domestic-like’ non-domestic meters.

Electricity consumption
The non-domestic subnational electricity consumption data contains all electricity meters
in non-domestic profile classes (0, 3-8). ND-NEED meter population dataset contains all
these meters and any meters in domestic profile classes (1 and 2) that can be matched to
a non-domestic address.

Gas consumption
The non-domestic subnational gas consumption data contains all gas meters that
consume greater than 73.2 MWh. ND-NEED meter population dataset contains all these
meters and any meters that consume less than 73.2 MWh that can be matched to a non-
domestic address.

More information on the differences between the ND-NEED meter population dataset and
the non-domestic subnational dataset can be found in the Method section.

Figure 7a shows that meter level electricity consumption is highest in London and the South-
East (16% and 14% of the total ND-NEED electricity meter level consumption respectively),
and lowest in the North East and Wales (5% and 7% respectively). This is in line with the
number of non-domestic building in these regions, with London and the South East containing
the highest number of non-domestic buildings, and the North East and Wales containing the
lowest number of non-domestic buildings.
Figure 7b shows that the meter level gas consumption has a slightly different regional pattern
than electricity. It is highest in the North West (17%), Yorkshire and the Humber (13%) and
London (13%). This could be driven by the high gas demands of factories in these traditionally
industrial areas, as factories consume more than twice as much gas as any other ND-NEED
building use (see Table 7b in the accompany data tables). This interpretation is supported by
the fact that the North West is the region that contains the most factories floor area (14%),
followed closely by Yorkshire and the Humber (14%). As with meter level electricity
consumption, the regions with the lowest meter level gas consumption are in the North-East
(5%) and Wales (6%).

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
28

Figure 7: Meter level consumption of non-domestic buildings by region in England and
Wales, 2021

Figure 7a: Electricity meter consumption
Figure 7b: Gas meter consumption
Non-domestic total consumption by region, split by building use (ND-NEED
weighted matched sample)
Non-domestic building consumption can also be estimated using the ND-NEED weighted
matched sample. This method relies upon a sample which is weighted up to represent the
population, and therefore will be less accurate than the ND-NEED meter population data.
However, this data includes building stock information, and therefore can be presented at a
building use level. An analysis of the accuracy of the weighted matched sample when
compared to the meter level data is available in the Method section.
Tables 7 and 8 show the proportion of electricity and gas consumed by region in England and
Wales based on the weighted ND-NEED matched sample. This is shown for the four ND-
NEED building uses with the largest number of buildings. These are the same building uses
that were presented for the building stock in Tables 2-6. Consumption data for other building
uses can be found in the Tables 7A and 7B of the accompanying data tables.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
29

Table 7 shows that 34% of electricity consumed by offices is consumed in London. Table 2
shows that 21% of offices are in London, which suggests that offices in London consume an
above average amount of electricity. On average, offices in London are larger than in other
parts of England and Wales (average office floor area in London is 312m2, compared to 238m2
in England and Wales(see accompanying data table 2). This may contribute to their high
electricity consumption.
Table 7: Proportion of electricity consumption by region in England and Wales by
building use using ND-NEED weighted matched sample data

Region
Factories
Offices
Shops
Warehouses
All Building
uses
England
89%
94%
95%
97%
93%
North East
10%
3%
5%
3%
6%
North West
20%
8%
13%
16%
14%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
13%
8%
10%
9%
11%
East Midlands
11%
5%
8%
11%
9%
West Midlands
9%
6%
9%
12%
9%
East
8%
8%
10%
14%
10%
London
3%
34%
17%
10%
14%
South East
9%
17%
14%
13%
13%
South West
6%
6%
9%
7%
8%
Wales
11%
6%
5%
3%
7%
Total
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
30

Table 8 shows that Yorkshire and the Humber and the North West are each responsible for
around one quarter of the gas consumed in factories. Table 2 shows that the North West
contains 12% of factories in England and Wales, and Yorkshire and the Humber contains 11%.
Table 3 shows that both regions contain 14% factory floor area in England and Wales. This
suggests these factories are larger than average, which may contribute to their high gas
consumption.
Table 8: Proportion of gas consumption by region in England and Wales by building use
using ND-NEED weighted matched sample data

Region
Factories
Offices
Shops
Warehouses
All Building
uses
England
91%
97%
95%
95%
92%
North East
4%
4%
5%
5%
5%
North West
24%
11%
13%
13%
16%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
26%
11%
10%
11%
15%
East Midlands
9%
9%
8%
13%
9%
West Midlands
8%
7%
10%
12%
9%
East
8%
12%
9%
13%
10%
London
4%
23%
18%
11%
11%
South East
5%
13%
14%
11%
11%
South West
4%
7%
8%
6%
7%
Wales
9%
3%
5%
5%
8%
Total
100%
100%
100%
100%
100%

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
31

4. Method
To produce the results in the ND-NEED geographical annex two new datasets are created.
These are:
The ND-NEED Geographical Annex dataset.
The ND-NEED Geographical Annex dataset is the ND-NEED dataset used in the main report,
with geographical area information added.
The ND-NEED dataset contains all ND-NEED non-domestic buildings in England and Wales. It
is based on the non-domestic ratings data from the VOA which contain all non-domestic
hereditaments that pay business rates. This data is aggregated to the building level. Certain
building uses are excluded as they are not considered to be buildings. This creates a dataset
of 1,763,000 ND-NEED non-domestic buildings with information on their building use and
building size.
These 1.8 million non-domestic buildings are then matched to electricity and gas consumption
information held by DESNZ, using address matching. This matches around 50% of buildings to
their electricity consumption data and 20% of buildings to their gas consumption data.
Consumption from these ‘matched’ buildings is weighted to produce consumption figures for
the whole non-domestic building population.
This dataset is used to produce geographical breakdowns of non-domestic building number,
non-domestic floor area and non-domestic electricity/gas consumption (by building use only).
The ND-NEED Geographical meter dataset.
The ND-NEED Geographical meter dataset is the ND-NEED meter population dataset with
geographical area information added.
The ND-NEED meter population dataset contains all non-domestic meters and is used in the
main ND-NEED report to inform the weights used to scale up consumption of the matched
buildings in the ND-NEED dataset.
This dataset is used to produce geographical breakdowns of non-domestic electricity and gas
consumption.
Creating the ND-NEED Geographical Annex Dataset
The ND-NEED dataset contains all non-domestic buildings in England and Wales with
information about their building use and building size. The following steps were taken to
convert this to a geographical annex dataset.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
32

Adding geographical area information
The ND-NEED dataset contains postcode information for over 99.6% of the UK’s 1,763,000
non-domestic buildings. This enabled 1,756,000 buildings in the ND-NEED dataset to be
matched against the ONS NSPL (May 2023) by postcode. This is summarised in Figure 8.
During matching, 6,000 buildings failed to match because their postcodes were not in the
NSPL, leaving an ND-NEED Geographical dataset of 1,756,000 non-domestic buildings which
have associated geographical area codes (region, LA, PC). This is 99.6% of the main ND-
NEED dataset.
The region, LA and PC codes were matched against the codes in the ONS Names and Codes
lookup tables to provide names for the PC, LA and regions (last updated December 2022 for
PC and regions, and April 2023 for LA).
This year, local authorities have been updated and this has decreased the number of local
authorities from 336 in 2020 to 318. For more information, see Table 9.
Table 9: Change in local authorities (LA’s) from 2020 to 2023
Region
Old Local Authorities
New Local Authorities
North West
Allerdale
Cumberland

Carlisle

Copeland

Barrow-in-Furness
Westmorland and Furness

Eden

South Lakeland

Yorkshire and The Humber
Craven
North Yorkshire

Hambleton

Harrogate

Richmondshire

Ryedale

Scarborough

Selby

East Midlands
Corby
North Northamptonshire

East Northamptonshire

Kettering
Wellingborough

Daventry
Northampton
West Northamptonshire

South Northamptonshire

South West
Mendip
Somerset

Sedgemoor

Somerset West and Taunton

South Somerset

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
33

Figure 8: Production of the ND-NEED geographical annex dataset

Rural/urban flag
The NSPL also contains information on whether a building is in a rural or urban location. This
is used to add a flag to all non-domestic buildings in a rural rather than urban postcode,
according to the ONS definition.
Off-gas grid flag
To determine whether a building was in an area where it could not reasonably connect to the
gas National Transmission System – Great Britain’s interconnected gas supply network (‘the
gas grid’) - the Xoserve off-gas grid postcode dataset is used, as outlined below and
summarised in Figure 9.
The Xoserve dataset contains all postcodes in the Great Britain that have no connections to
the gas grid in 2023. This is then matched against the ND-NEED data by postcode. Where a
building is in a postcode identified by the Xoserve dataset to have no buildings, domestic or
non-domestic, with a connection to the gas distribution network, it is initially flagged as ‘off-gas
grid’. A total of 297,000 non-domestic buildings were flagged as off-gas grid.
The buildings flagged as off-gas grid were checked to see if they had a gas meter reading in
2021. There were 2,500 buildings marked as in a postcode with no buildings connected to the
gas grid in 2023, but had a gas meter reading in 2021. The off-gas grid flag was removed from
these buildings, leaving 294,000 off-gas grid buildings.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
34

However, an unknown number of buildings are missing gas consumption data as described in
the ND-NEED matched sample method section. It is therefore likely that more than 2,500
buildings marked as in an off-gas grid postcode consumed gas in 2021. Assuming that the
address matching success rate for gas meters is similar to electricity data (about 50%), this
suggests that the true number of buildings marked as in on off-gas grid postcodes, but
consuming gas, to be 4,000-5,000. This would suggest that 294,000 off-gas grid buildings is a
small overestimate.
All buildings not matched to an off-gas grid postcode, with no postcode or with a gas meter
reading of greater than 0 kWh are considered to be ‘on-gas grid’. This means that buildings
that have chosen not to be connected to the gas grid are considered to be ‘on-gas grid’.
Figure 9: Merging ND-NEED with Xoserve Off-Gas Grid data

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
35

Comparison with domestic off-gas grid method
The method used for estimating the number of domestic properties not connected to the gas
grid differs slightly from that used here. It deducts the number of gas meters in a region from
the number of properties. This method is less suitable for non-domestic buildings due to:
1. Deducting the number of gas meters in a region from the number of non-domestic buildings
would overestimate the number of off-gas grid buildings. This is because low consuming
non-domestic buildings are identified by address-matching; if a gas meter matches to an
ND-NEED non-domestic building address, it is considered to be non-domestic. However,
due to limitations of the address-matching algorithm, not all low consuming non-domestic
meters are detected in ND-NEED. The number of gas meters is therefore an
underestimate, causing the difference between the number of buildings and the number of
gas meters to be too large.
2. The domestic approach would also capture buildings that lay in on-grid areas but have
chosen not to connect.
Weighted Matched Sample Consumption Data
The ND-NEED Geographical Annex dataset contains 1,756,000 non-domestic buildings all of
which have geographic area information, information about building use and building size
(though 19% of buildings are missing building size information as described in the ‘missing
floor area’ section) and rural/urban and off-gas grid flags.
A sample of around 50% of the buildings in this dataset also have electricity consumption
information, and around 20% also have gas consumption information. This sample is scaled up
with weights calculated based on a building’s use and size, to remove bias in the matching
process. This weighting does not take into account geographical biases in the matching
process. This is described in the ‘missing consumption data’ section.
Information about the non-domestic building stock and energy use in each region, LA and PC
could then be obtained by summarising this dataset. This could optionally be split or filtered by
building use or building size.
This data was calculated based on the methods described in Table 10.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
36

Table 10: Methods for summarising non-domestic building data by geography

Variable
Method
Total Number
Count the number of rows of data.
Floor Area, Weighted
Electricity or Gas
Consumption
Sum all values of non-domestic buildings floor area or weighted
electricity and gas consumption data, including zero values where
the data is missing from ND-NEED.
Sample size of
variable
Count the number of non-domestic buildings in the ND-NEED
dataset with a non-zero and non-NA value for: Floor area; Electricity
and Gas Consumption.
Share of variable

Divide variable for each geography by the England and Wales total
and multiply by 100. The England and Wales total is taken as the
matched ND-NEED Geographical Annex total, ignoring buildings that
were not matched to a geography, to allow for direct comparisons
between geographies. This was done for the following variables:
Number of Buildings; Floor area; Energy, Electricity and Gas
Consumption.

Disclosure: where there are fewer than five buildings in a consumption data point, or a building
represents over 90% of the total, consumption data will be removed. Where there is only one
geographical area (for example, region) that meets this condition, to avoid disclosure by
residual, the next closest data point laying within the same upper level area (for example,
country) is also supressed.
Missing floor area data in ND-NEED Geographical Annex
dataset
In ND-NEED 2023 dataset, 329,000 (19%) of buildings do not have floor area data. This is
because:
1. This information is missing from the VOA data that ND-NEED is based on (10%).

2. The floor area information is removed from the ND-NEED dataset because the data is
believed to be unreliable, around 1 per cent of the total ND-NEED floor area.
a. This is done for all buildings with a floor area of less than 15m2 (14%). This
removes around 1,500,000m2 of floor area.
b. This is done for buildings in subsectors not used to inform the VOA’s building
rating (9%). This removes around 4,000,000m2 of floor area. 20

20 For a full list of subsectors that have floor area removed for all ND-NEED buildings, please see Annex D in the
methodology note of ND-NEED 2023.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
37

This means that 329,000 (19%) of buildings in the ND-NEED Geographical Annex are also
missing floor area data. The remaining buildings failed to match into the Geographical Annex
due to missing or incorrect postcodes.
The exact amount of floor area missing from ND-NEED is not known and therefore cannot be
accounted for. All floor area data presented is therefore believed to be an underestimate.
Table 11 shows the proportion of non-domestic buildings that are missing floor area data in
each region, for the for largest ND-NEED building uses. The ‘Totals’ column shows that there
is not a huge difference between the number of non-domestic buildings in each region that are
missing floor area data, so comparisons between regions can reasonably be made.
However, this is not the case for building uses. From Table 11 it can be seen that the
proportion of buildings missing floor area information in the ND-NEED Geographical Annex
dataset varies substantially between building uses. Floor area data has therefore only been
presented for building uses where less than 20% of buildings are missing floor area data. For
all of these building uses the principal reason floor area data is missing is because it was
removed from buildings with a floor area of <15m2. This suggests that the absence of this floor
area data doesn’t have a large effect on the total floor area presented.
These building uses missing less than 20% of floor area data were: Factories; Offices; Shops;
and Warehouses. The following remaining building uses were combined to create an ‘All other
building uses’ category: Arts, Community and Leisure; Education; Emergency Services;
Health; Hospitality; and Other. Around 55% of buildings in the ‘All other building uses’ category
are missing floor area data.
Due to variations, floor area comparisons between building uses must be done with caution.
A full breakdown of total floor area and proportion of buildings missing floor area, by region and
building use, is available in Table 2 in the accompanying data tables.
Floor area data is also presented at the LA and PC level for the four building uses where more
than 80% of buildings have floor area present in the accompanying data tables (Table 2 and
9).

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
38

Table 11: Percentage of non-domestic buildings missing floor area data

Region
Factories
Offices Shops Warehouses
All other
building
uses
All building
uses
England
2%
14%
3%
6%
54%
18%
North East
1%
12%
2%
9%
57%
19%
North West
2%
13%
2%
5%
54%
17%
Yorkshire and
The Humber
3%
13%
3%
8%
56%
19%
East
Midlands
1%
12%
3%
4%
52%
17%
West
Midlands
2%
13%
3%
3%
50%
15%
East
1%
13%
3%
6%
55%
20%
London
8%
17%
4%
7%
36%
14%
South East
2%
14%
3%
5%
51%
17%
South West
2%
13%
3%
7%
68%
27%
Wales
2%
14%
3%
15%
63%
25%
England &
Wales
2%
14%
3%
6%
55%
19%
Weighting the ND-NEED matched sample consumption
dataset
ND-NEED matches VOA building stock data to meter level energy consumption data held by
DESNZ using an address matching algorithm. However, this matching process is only able to
match 2021 electricity consumption meter data to 864,000 buildings out of the 1,763,000
buildings in the ND-NEED dataset. Of these 864,000 buildings, 357,000 were also successfully
matched to 2021 gas consumption meter data.
This means that consumption data for 899,000 non-domestic buildings is not available. In ND-
NEED 2023, weights are used to scale up the ND-NEED sample consumption to the ND-
NEED population level.
The ND-NEED weights take into account differences in the address matching rate between
building use and building size. This is done by stratifying the building population and the
matched sample based on a building’s use and size, creating a matrix. For each cell, the
population count is divided by the matched sample count. This creates a weight for each
building.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
39

This weighting for each building is then adjusted for electricity and gas consumption. The
number of electricity or gas meters in the matched sample multiplied by their building weight is
compared with the number of meters in the ND-NEED meter level population, split by
consumption band and meter profile. The difference gives an electricity and gas weighting for
each building in the matched sample. These weights allow the matched sample to represent
the non-domestic building population in England and Wales.
However, this weighting process does not account for geography. Therefore, the ability to
compare the data between geographical areas is dependent on the proportion of buildings that
are missing consumption data being consistent between these areas.
Table 12 shows that this is broadly true for electricity consumption at the regional level with the
number of non-domestic buildings missing 2021 electricity consumption data broadly similar
(ranging from 48% to 54%) across the regions.
Note, it is assumed that all non-domestic buildings use electricity from the Great Britain
National Grid, and therefore should have electricity consumption data in ND-NEED. Any
building that does not have electricity consumption information is therefore considered to
be missing this information.
Table 12: Number of non-domestic buildings with 2021 electricity consumption data in
ND-NEED 2023

Region
Number of
buildings
Number of buildings
with electricity data
Proportion of
buildings with
electricity data
England
1,645,000
812,000
49%
North East
75,000
39,000
52%
North West
223,000
109,000
49%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
182,000
88,000
49%
East Midlands
138,000
69,000
50%
West Midlands
164,000
81,000
49%
East
176,000
87,000
49%
London
243,000
115,000
47%
South East
245,000
122,000
50%
South West
199,000
102,000
51%
Wales
111,000
51,000
46%
Total
1,756,000
862,000
49%

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
40

Table 13 shows the number of non-domestic buildings with 2021 gas meter readings in the
ND-NEED matched sample, split by region. It shows that the proportion of all non-domestic
buildings that have gas meter data is similar (18-22%) across the regions. This suggests that
regional comparisons are reasonable.
Note, as not all non-domestic buildings are thought to have a gas connection the proportion
of non-domestic buildings missing gas consumption information cannot be calculated. To
assess the validity of comparing gas consumption data between regions we therefore rely
on the assumption that the proportion of buildings with gas connections is similar between
regions.

Table 13: Sample size of non-domestic buildings with 2021 gas consumption data in
unscaled ND-NEED matched sample

This data is also available split by building uses in Tables 7A and 7B of the accompanying data
tables.
However, this data cannot be presented at PC and LA level. The extra granularity means that
there are large differences in the proportion of buildings missing consumption data between
geographies. As the weighting process does not take into account these differences between
geography, the weighted matched sample does not represent the population at these levels.

Region
Number of
buildings
Number of buildings
with gas data
Proportion of
buildings with gas
data
England
1,645,000
336,000
20%
North East
75,000
15,000
21%
North West
223,000
50,000
22%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
182,000
39,000
21%
East Midlands
138,000
29,000
21%
West Midlands
164,000
34,000
21%
East
176,000
32,000
18%
London
243,000
51,000
21%
South East
245,000
49,000
20%
South West
199,000
37,000
19%
Wales
111,000
20,000
18%
Total
1,756,000
356,000
20%

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
41

Creating the Geographical ND-NEED meter dataset
This method uses meter-level data from the 2,241,000 electricity and 557,000 gas meters in
non-domestic buildings in England and Wales (the ND-NEED meter population).
The electricity and gas meters are matched to the ONS NSPL (May 2023) by postcode to
obtain their associated geographical area codes (region, LA, PC). Due to missing postcodes,
4,900 electricity meters and 1,750 gas meters could not be matched. A further 20,600
electricity and 950 gas meters with postcodes failed to match to an active postcode in the
NSPL.
The region, LA and PC codes were then matched against the codes in the ONS Names and
Codes lookup tables to provide names for the PC, LA and regions (last updated December
2022 for PC and regions, and April 2023 for LA). This created the Geographical ND-NEED
meter dataset which contains contains 2,215,000 electricity meters and 554,000 gas meters,
with information about their geographical location. This is summarised in Figure 10.
Information about the energy use in each region, LA and PC could then be obtained by
summarising this dataset.
The key advantage of this method is that all electricity and gas consumption from all non-
domestic buildings is captured. This allows meaningful comparisons of consumption between
all geographical area.
However, as the meters have not been matched to the corresponding non-domestic building
the data cannot be broken down by building use or building size or provide any information on
the distribution of the non-domestic building stock.
In keeping with the method use for the Subnational consumption data, which provides the
basis for this dataset, data for any geographical areas that contain less than five meters, or
where two meters represent over 90% of the total, will be removed. Where there is only one
geographical area (for example, parliamentary constituency) that meets this condition, to avoid
disclosure by residual, the next closest data point - laying within the same upper level area (for
example, region) - to also meeting the condition is also suppressed. The total for the upper
level area remains unchanged. In this year’s data, no areas have been suppressed.
Note, the ND-NEED meter population dataset contains all non-domestic electricity and
gas meters in England and Wales. This means it includes meters that are located in ‘non-
buildings’ such as car parks.

Consumption from these ‘non-buildings’ is excluded from the ND-NEED 2023
consumption totals. However, as the meters in the ND-NEED meter population dataset
have not been associated with their corresponding building, the meters in these ‘non-
buildings cannot be identified for removal.

The inclusion of these ‘non-buildings’ will inflate the consumption of the ND-NEED meter
population by 10-15%.

More information on non-buildings can be found on page 23 of the ND-NEED 2023
report.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
42

Figure 10: Production of the Geographical ND-NEED meter dataset

Comparing the measures of non-domestic consumption
Two methods of presenting non-domestic electricity and gas consumption have been
presented: the weighted version of the matched ND-NEED sample; and the ND-NEED
electricity and gas meter population used to create the sample. A third way is published in the
Subnational electricity and gas consumption statistics. Table 14 summarises the key
differences between these measures.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
43

Table 14: Comparison of measures of non-domestic consumption
Comparison
ND-NEED
buildings:
weighted
matched
sample
ND-NEED meter
population
Subnational
consumption
statistics: Non-
domestic
consumers
Non-domestic coverage
All non-domestic
buildings that
pay business
rates, excluding
‘non-buildings’
All electricity meters
of profile 3+ and gas
meters with annual
consumption of >73
MWh, plus smaller
non-domestic building
consumers falling
outside these bands
All electricity meters
of profile class 3 to 8
and half-hourly
meters + and gas
meters with annual
consumption of >73
MWh
Geographical coverage
England and
Wales
England and Wales
Great Britain
England &
Wales 2021
consumption
Electricity
(GWh)
126,643
145,788
142,734
Gas (GWh)
150,323
166,994
161,312
England &
Wales 2021
meters
Electricity
n/a
2,241,236
2,229,579
Gas
n/a
556,955
243,755
Geography split
Regions
LA and PC
LA (and below)
Non-Domestic building
use split
ND-NEED
categories
No
No
Includes non-domestic
“non-buildings”?
No
Yes
Yes
Includes smaller21 non-
domestic building
consumers?
Yes
Yes
No

Validating the regional breakdown of ND-NEED weighted matched sample
consumption data against ND-NEED meter level consumption data
The assumption that the ND-NEED matched sample is not regionally biased can be tested by
comparing the ND-NEED weighted matched sample against the ND-NEED meter level
population.

21 Non-domestic buildings with electricity meters in profiles 1 or 2, and/or gas meters with consumption of less
than 73.2MWh. These would be considered domestic in Subnational energy consumption data.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
44

The ND-NEED meter level dataset includes consumption from 142,000 establishments that
ND-NEED considers not to be buildings (‘non-buildings’), and therefore are excluded from the
ND-NEED 2023 dataset. The 19 TWh electricity and 17 TWh gas consumption difference
between the meter level data and the weighted sample is therefore likely to be due to
consumption from the ‘non-buildings’.
However, assuming that the proportion of consumption from non-buildings is evenly distributed
between the regions, a direct comparison, shown in Table 15, can be made between the
proportion of consumption between the meter level data and the weighted matched sample.
Table 15: Comparison of proportion of non-domestic building consumption between
meter level data and weighted matched sample.

This shows that the proportion of electricity and gas consumed by non-domestic buildings in
each region is highly correlated between meter level consumption data and the weighted
matched sample data (99% correlation for electricity and gas.)
For example, electricity consumption in the North East makes up 4.7% of the total for England
and Wales according to ND-NEED meter level data, and 5.7% of the total electricity
consumption in the ND-NEED matched sample, a difference of 1.0 percentage points. There is
less than 2.2 percentage points difference in the proportions between meter level data and
weighted matched sample data for most regions in both electricity and gas consumption.
Consumption data using both meter level data and weighted matched sample data is available
in the accompanying tables at regional level.
Region
Share of electricity
consumption (%)

Share of gas consumption
(%)
Meter level
Weighted
Matched
Sample

Meter level
Weighted
Matched
Sample
England
93.5%
93.2%

94.0%
92.4%
North East
4.7%
5.7%

5.5%
5.2%
North West
12.3%
13.9%

16.6%
16.4%
Yorkshire and The
Humber
9.9%
11.4%

13.0%
14.9%
East Midlands
8.6%
8.7%

9.5%
9.1%
West Midlands
9.3%
9.0%

9.9%
8.9%
East
10.1%
10.2%

8.2%
9.6%
London
15.7%
13.5%

12.7%
10.9%
South East
14.2%
13.1%

11.5%
10.6%
South West
8.7%
7.6%

7.2%
6.9%
Wales
6.5%
6.8%

6.0%
7.6%

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
45

The strong correlation at regional level between the meter population and the weighted
matched sample is not seen once the consumption is broken down into smaller geographical
areas. The extra granularity in the breakdown of the data makes any geographical bias in the
weighted matched sample more visible. This causes the correlation between meter level
consumption and the weighted matched sample consumption at PC level to drop to 78% for
electricity and 55% for gas. Furthermore, in 12% of PCs the weighted matched sample
consumption value is more than 50% larger or smaller than the meter level data. This data is
therefore not presented in the data tables.
Creating Geographical ND-NEED maps
The ND-NEED Geographical Annex dataset was also matched to ONS boundary shapefiles of
each PC (updated Dec 2022) or LA (updated May 2023) by PC code or LA code respectively.
This is summarised in Figure 11.
Region boundaries were calculated by grouping PCs together by region and merging
boundaries to form regional boundaries. The regional boundaries could then be matched to the
regional ND-NEED data by region name.
Heatmaps could then be produced, by filling each PC’s, LA’s or region’s boundaries with a
colour based on the concentration of a variable in each geography. This was done using the R
Leaflet package. As it was common for most areas to have values closer to the median than to
the outliers, a base 10 log scale was used to determine the colour scales, allowing the
heatmaps to show differentiation between areas more clearly.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
46

Figure 11: Production of the Geographical ND-NEED heatmaps

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
47

5.Further information
Accompanying tables
The following tables are available on the department’s statistics webpage for ND-NEED:

At regional level:
• Table 1 shows the number of ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by building use*.

• Table 2 shows the floor area of ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by building use*.

• Table 3A shows the number of ND-NEED non-domestic off-gas grid buildings, by rural
and urban.

• Table 3B shows the number of off-gas grid ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by
building use.

• Table 4 shows the energy consumption from ND-NEED meters*.

• Table 5 shows the ND-NEED number of non-domestic buildings larger than 1,000m2, by
building use*.

• Table 6 shows the ND-NEED number of non-domestic buildings smaller than or equal to
1,000m2, by building use*.

• Table 7A shows the scaled ND-NEED non-domestic electricity consumption, by building
use*.

• Table 7B shows the scaled ND-NEED non-domestic gas consumption, by building use*.

At local authority level:
• Table 1 shows the number of ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by building use*.

• Table 2 shows the floor area of ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by building use*.

• Table 3A shows the number of ND-NEED non-domestic off-gas grid buildings, by rural
and urban.

• Table 4 shows the energy consumption from ND-NEED meter population*

At parliamentary constituency level:
• Table 8 shows the number of ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by building use. *

• Table 9 shows the floor area of ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by building use.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
48

• Table 10 shows the number of off-gas grid ND-NEED non-domestic buildings, by rural
and urban*.

• Table 11 shows the energy consumption from ND-NEED meter population.
Future updates to these statistics
The next release of these statistics is intended to be following the main ND-NEED publication,
the next update of which is planned for the summer of 2024.
The following updates will also be considered for future editions:
• With regards to the ND-NEED matched sample consumption data, an improved
weighting method will be considered. This may include adapting the weighting
methodology to take into account geographical biases in the ND-NEED matched
sample. This would allow building use level consumption data to be presented at a LA
and PC level.

• Additional analysis and weighting will be considered to improve the reliability of floor
area data. This would allow floor area data to be presented for more building uses.

• The publication of geographical breakdowns of ND-NEED consumption and building
stock data for additional years, prior to those presented here, will be considered.
Related statistics
The Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023
Previous release of the ND-NEED statistics, August 2023.
Non-domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework: energy statistics 2006-2012
Previous release of the ND-NEED statistics, March 2015.
The non-domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework (ND-NEED)
Overview of the concept of ND-NEED, known issues, plans for improvement, preliminary results
and the proposed weighting methodology, May 2014.
National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework (NEED)
Summary statistics of domestic energy consumption 2005-2021, June 2023.

Non-Domestic National Energy Efficiency Data-Framework 2023 Geographical Annex
49

Revisions policy
The DESNZ statistical revisions policy sets out the revisions policy for these statistics, which
has been developed in accordance with the UK Statistics Authority Code of Practice for
Statistics.
Code of Practice for Statistics compliance
These official statistics comply with the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code
of Practice for Statistics.

These data support geographical analysis of non-domestic buildings electricity and gas
consumption, as well as off-gas grid analysis. Data and processing undergo careful quality
assurance, and users are kept informed about significant changes. Details of key data
limitations can be found within the relevant coverage and data limitation sections of the method
section, as well as the main ND-NEED 2023 methodology note.

Our statistical practice is regulated by the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR). OSR sets the
standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics that all
producers of official statistics should adhere to. You are welcome to contact us directly
(xxx@xxx.xx) with any comments about how we meet these
standards. Alternatively, you can contact OSR by emailing xxx@xxx.xx or via
the OSR website.
User engagement
Users are encouraged to provide comments and feedback on how these statistics are used
and how well they meet user needs. Comments on any issues relating to this statistical release
are welcomed and should be sent to: xxx@xxx.xx.
The DESNZ statement on statistical public engagement and data standards sets out the
department’s commitments on public engagement and data standards as outlined by the Code
of Practice for Statistics.
Contact
• Responsible statistician: James Hemingway
• Email: xxx@xxx.xx
• Media enquiries: xx-xxxx-xxxx
• Statistical enquiries: xx-xxxx-xxxx

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