Actively managing energy in buildings can help organizations reduce energy use, save money, and create more comfortable and productive spaces.
What is
Energy Management?
Organizational energy management is a continuous
improvement process that adds value to an organization and its operations. An energy management program assesses building energy performance, identifies ways to improve, and establishes good energy use practices for continuous improvement.
Focusing on organizational energy use gives you more control and ability
to reduce your operating costs, increase
overall energy efficiency, and promote more sustainable and efficient operations.
Instead of reactive management, an energy management
strategy is based on a proactive and well-coordinated effort to manage the
resources and services used by your facilities.
A successful energy management program is a commitment and
requires several key elements:
- People: Your
organization will need an energy manager or champion who has support from executive,
administration, and facility staff. While not all organizations need a
full-time position, success requires a dedicated commitment of time and
resources (e.g., 0.25 FTE is a common threshold).
- Policy & Planning:
Effective energy management requires foundational policy and planning to guide
the energy management process. This includes setting clear goals and action
plans, with incentives to encourage action and regular communications to staff.
- Taking Action:
Once improvement opportunities are identified, your organization needs to be
committed to making changes to facility equipment, operations, or practices.
These improvements can vary, and may include low/no-cost retrofits, behavior
change campaigns, or long-term capital investments. Once action has been taken,
it is critical to track your progress and share your successes.
Assess, Act,
Evaluate
All energy management programs follow the basic
structure of Assess, Act, and Evaluate.
Assess
The
primary goal of the assessment phase is to build an understanding of your
current state and operations (commonly referred to as a “baseline”). This will
typically involve data collection and analysis, assessment or audits, and evaluating
the results against comparable peers or values. This process can help you
understand current energy uses and practices, identify best opportunities for
improvements, and establish reference points for future action. A commonly used
data collection tool is
ENERGY
STAR Portfolio Manager .
Act
After the
assessment phase, you will need to develop a roadmap to improve your energy
performance and meet the goals established by your energy management team. Use
a detailed “Energy Action Plan” to establish the steps and processes needed to
systematically meet your goals. The action plan will define technical and
administrative steps and determine the roles and responsibilities for each
step. Before moving forward, it is critical that your organization understands
and agrees to the action plan.
Evaluate
As you
implement your action plan, it is important to track and monitor your progress.
Many action plans detail performance measures and metrics that can be reviewed
and reported on regularly. As part of this evaluation, communicate successes
and areas for further improvement to your organization. Regular evaluation will
also provide measurements and
results of your work and inform future actions
and decisions for your organization.
Energy
Management Tools & Resources
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Management Programs