Manage building assets to help better control energy costs

Global energy consumption increased 2.2% in 2023, despite rising energy costs in many parts of the world.1 The impact of the buildings – and their energy efficiency – can’t be overlooked when it comes to managing overall energy costs.  

Whether you’re retrofitting an entire building or updating specific assets, it’s important to thoughtfully manage your building assets to enhance how you monitor, control and optimize systems to meet your energy consumption goals and potentially lower your energy bills. 

Create a Baseline

Think of managing energy use like any other journey where you want to make a change. You need know where you are starting from before you start.  

For example, if you’re on a health and wellness journey, you need to know how much you weigh and what your daily activity is so that you can manage progress towards your goal – whether it’s weight loss or getting in more steps every day.  

From a building energy use perspective, this means creating a baseline understanding of your building profile and its energy use intensity (EUI). This includes conducting a detailed audit of asset-level energy use to identify which assets and systems in your building use the most energy and how efficiently they are performing. This should include looking at the building management system (BMS). Many buildings may have a legacy BMS that may result in performance degradations over time and configurations that fall out of tune. A modern BMS can help resolve these issues and also leverage existing building T1L wiring systems to enable faster installation and commissioning. 

Consider end-to-end systems  

Initiatives to increase efficiency of one asset or its level of control can impact – and potentially undermine – another, depending on the interconnectivity of devices and systems in your building.  

For example, replacing incandescent bulbs with thermally cooler and more energy efficient LED bulbs is often and effective way to save energy but it may reduce the cooling load of your HVAC system. While this can be a net positive, if you don’t consider this when you conduct lighting upgrades, you may oversize your HVAC system and negatively impact the building’s overall efficiency. Taking a holistic approach  

to whole-of-building optimization is can help identify these interdependencies and using tools like artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can also help identify opportunities for savings that may otherwise be missed. 

Leverage financial incentives and strategies

Many governments at the state- and country-level offer financial incentives to help cover upgrade costs of upgrades for projects that help to better manage a building’s energy use. Public incentives, such as the Refundable Investment Credit in Singapore2, the Green Industry Law in France3 and the Inflation Reduction Act in the United States4 can help to provide incentives either upfront as the project commences or after-project tax incentives. Additionally, Energy as a Service (EaaS) is a funding model that enables businesses to make energy improvements by energy and maintenance savings to fund the work and limit the upfront costs associated with upgrading or deploying new technologies. This is done by leveraging a private financier that can fund your energy projects. The financer maintains ownership of the assets for the duration of the service agreement with a service partner helping maintain and manage the equipment for you. 

Rising energy costs can present a significant challenge for building owners and operators. By conducting a comprehensive audit and creating an energy efficiency strategy customized for your building’s needs, you can create better energy efficiency that’s potentially better for your bottom line.   

To discover how Honeywell can help you reimagine energy use in your buildings, download our latest guide “Reimagine your approach to energy efficiency - Managing building assets to help better control energy costs” or request a consultation with one of Honeywell’s energy experts today. 

^[1] Enerdata, Total energy consumption, [Accessed September 2024]

^[2] A&M, Singapore, an Eco-Friendly City, and Government Incentives for Green Projects, May 29, 2024 [Accessed September 2024]

^[3] iea, Tax credit for investments in green industries- Batteries, June 10, 2024 [Accessed September 2024]

^[4] USGBC, IRA update: It’s a go for green building tax incentives, Jan 24, 2023 [Accessed September 2024]