Anything but basic – why the foundational steps of energy management matter

Buildings use a lot of energy with 30% of the global energy demand attributed to buildings in the form of electricity and gaseous, liquid and solid fuels and district energy for building energy uses (e.g. heating, cooling, cooking, lighting and equipment), and is responsible for around 27 per cent of global operational related CO2 emissions.[1] A question many facility managers ask: Where do I start when I want to better manage energy use? While every building has different needs and external factors like climate impacts how it operates, there are consistent principles to keep in mind.

Conducting an energy audit

Without clarity on a starting point, reaching a desired destination can be challenging. That’s why energy efficiency strategies need to start with an audit of building assets – from heating, cooling, lighting, plug loads and other miscellaneous assets – and their performance to establish an energy baseline. It’s important to understand which assets are using the most energy in a building to help create the right management plan. Audits should also include reviewing utility bills to understand fluctuations in energy rates as well as peak pricing in your area.

With a measure of kWh per square foot to establish the energy use intensity (EUI), facility managers can benchmark performance against comparative buildings to determine realistic goals.[2] When a building’s EUI is below the industry average, there is often greater opportunities to improve. Once the gap between existing performance and potential, realistic targets is established, the facility manager can begin to define energy efficiency measures.

Taking control

Once the audit is completed and a plan is developed, it’s time to start to implement improvement strategies. This can include a range of mechanical and equipment retrofits or upgrades such as installing variable frequency drives that modulate the speed of fans and pumps in HVAC systems, for example, or switching to LED lighting where it is not already in place. Adding smart metering capabilities can provide granular measures of energy use and event identify equipment that may be operating poorly.

One area not to be overlooked is your building management system (BMS). The right building control is the foundation of any energy reduction journey. By adjusting set points as occupancy, weather, demand and energy costs change, facility managers can start to make better use of equipment and assets. It’s important to select a BMS with cybersecurity protections built in and that offer ease of installation capabilities. Adding advance software controls to your BMS can help collect, analyze and identify energy waste and anomalies.

Optimizing for energy efficiency

The next step is to identify ways to continually optimize energy use at both the individual assets and building level. Deploying sensors to measure performance and detect faults and degradation that not only impact the reliability of an asset but also its energy consumption can help with optimization efforts. Advanced software controls can also detect correlations driving higher energy use and continually adjust systems to compensate.

Optimization is an ongoing continuous process. Over time, systems tend to drift. Changes in infrastructure, assets, equipment performance, weather energy costs and building use can cause energy savings and efficiency to decline even in efficient buildings. Facility managers need to regularly revisit steps of auditing, controlling and optimizing to avoid going backwards on forward progress.

To find out more about how Honeywell can help you reimagine energy efficiency for your buildings, click here or talk to your Honeywell representative today.

[1] United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), 2022 Global Status Report for Buildings and Construction, Nov 09, 2022 [Accessed August 13, 2024]

[2] Energy Star, US Energy Use Intensity by Property Type, August 2023 [Accessed August 6, 2024]