Greetings and welcome to the New Year! Have you come up with a resolution yet? I have. I’m going to do what I can to help reduce building energy consumption after reading a report from the New Buildings Institute (NBI), a nonprofit helping to promote better energy performance in buildings.

Last year the institute published the results of a study developed jointly with Ecotope, a consulting firm specializing in evaluating energy usage in the built environment. The study, entitled Sensitivity Analysis: Comparing the Impact of Design, Operation, and Tenant Behavior on Building Energy Performance, underscores the reality that end-users have an equally important, or an even more important, role as architects and engineers when it comes to energy conservation in the built environment. But while the study summarizes the extent to which operations and occupant behavior impact a building’s energy use, it also shows how buildings use energy and what aspects of building energy performance deserve more attention in design.

The primary areas where designers impact building efficiency are building envelope, HVAC system and lighting system. According to the study, best practices in envelope and lighting design can save at least 40 percent of total building energy use; poor practices can increase energy use by about 90 percent in all climate zones. When the effects of HVAC system selection are added, best design practices can lead to about a 50 percent savings, and worst practices can lead to a 60-210 percent increase in energy use, depending on climate.

The study also concludes that the design team has the largest potential impact on total building energy use. Part of this stems from the many design decisions that determine how much the building operators, and to a lesser degree tenants, can successfully manage their own behaviors to achieve efficient building performance.

The Other Half

After occupancy, operations and tenant behavior have a much greater potential to adversely impact energy use. Poor practices, according to the study, can increase energy use by as much as 30-60 percent or more, while best practices can reduce energy consumption by 10-20 percent across all climate zones. Metering and control strategies incorporated by the design team, as well as involving the building operations staff in the design process, commissioning and start-up procedures, can help minimize poor practices.

Interestingly, according to the report, tenants are seldom in a position to recognize the correlation between a behavior and energy consumption. So while occupant behavior has a significant impact on overall energy use, they might not understand that their behavior uses energy. To that end, submeters and energy dashboards are suggested to help tenants understand and reduce their energy use.

I recommend taking a look at the report yourself. At the time of this issue’s publication, you can find the full version of the study here http://bit.ly/t6qsdY.

At this time of New Year’s resolutions, I think reducing my own energy consumption and helping others to do the same is as good a resolution as any. At the very least, the odds are better that I’m going to stick to it as opposed to any resolution involving a gym membership.

Cheers,

Derrick Teal

 Editor