Although the rise of sustainable office buildings in the Netherlands is noteworthy, the focus of these projects lies mostly on new constructions. There are fewer initiatives to make existing buildings more energy efficient. The main reason is that traditional energy efficient solutions (such as new installations, insulation or renewable energy sources) still have a relatively long return on investment time.
Business cases for sustainable real estate need to have a short ROI time. Optimization of the climate systems can make a significant contribution. Building management systems are controlling climate systems for air conditioning and cooling in buildings. These building systems are often responsible for half of the energy consumption of a building, and actions are only taken in case of failure. Despite such a large contribution to the overall energy consumption, and thereby the costs incurred, these systems are managed primarily on output. For example, in a space that is cooled and heated simultaneously, no alarms will be generated as long as the temperature in that space is correct. Yet, there is unnecessary consumption of energy and an increasing risk of wear and errors.
Managing for Performance
The example above underlines that alarms preventions is the main goals of most technical engineers, not optimization. Lack of capacity, time and (technical) knowledge hinders proactive management. Only in case of failure, action will follow. While good insights will provide profits for the long term, there is a lack of good insight into the actual performance of facilities. Focus on performance, however, demands proper management information. The challenge is to transform the data of current systems into actual controllable and management information. This requires strong analytical tools; tools that identify inefficiencies, which are not -or merely- visible after manual analysis.
With accurate control information, it is possible to better align the use of existing facilities without major investments, renovations and downtime. An energy reduction of 15 to 35 percent can be realized by optimizing building-related air conditioning systems. Since these are the biggest energy consuming systems this contributes to substantial cost reduction. Furthermore, having insight into the actual performance of installations has a positive effect on their availability and reliability. In particular in buildings where climate control systems are crucial (such as in hospitals), the availability and reliability of installations are even more important than energy reduction is.
By using the available systems and installations in smart ways, every building can be a smart building, without any disruption to the occupier.