What you don’t see or know about your building operation can cost you. We’ve found countless times, in virtually every building type, equipment or control system operations gone awry. Sometimes problems can’t be solved relying on data analysis. Today we’re going under the hood of...
Utilizing the full capabilities of your control system is one of the most cost-effective ways to save energy. We find very few facilities maximize the full capabilities of already installed systems. Nowhere is this more detrimental than in grocery stores where controls operate the commercial...
ENERGY STAR® Portfolio Manager will be shaking up the energy-use benchmark world by updating their scoring mechanism on August 26, 2018. The bad news is most building owners will see a drop in the current score. The good news is the update is long overdue...
There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. - Mark Twain. One of the big problems with energy efficiency is that it’s complicated. I feel like there’s a big need to simplify it for clients so they can make the most informative...
We’re only just past the halfway-point of the year, but things have been abuzz in California’s energy policy world. Below are a few bills and general policy items you should be keeping an eye on: Energy Efficiency Business Plans (A.17-01-013) On May 31, the CPUC (California Public...
Just as the PC industry faced consolidation in the late 80’s, the lighting industry is also consolidating. Legrand started it off when it bought WattStopper and Vantage/Equinox/LCAP decades ago. Philips is now Signify. Siemens recently purchased Enlighted. GE has begun the process to sell their lighting and control...
I can’t tell you how happy I am that I can say that ASHRAE Standard 211 – the world’s first comprehensive standard for energy audits – is out! This news might come as a surprise to some – most people treated the energy audit levels defined...
As energy engineers looking for potential energy savings during energy audits, retro-commissioning investigations and ongoing commissioning, we typically use trend reviews to evaluate the effectiveness of control logic. Trends offer a window into what the controls accomplished in the past. They need to be interpreted...
In a previous post, I wrote about smartphone apps and their inadequacy with respect to illuminance measurements (that is, their ability to measure footcandles or lux). That post took a deep dive into why smartphones are not up to snuff as a professional light meter....
Changes to utility rate periods are beginning to be implemented and can impact your bottom line. On December 1, 2017, San Diego Gas & Electric (SDG&E) became the first investor-owned utility (IOU) in the state to break tradition and with the California Public Utilities Commission’s...