With the climate discussions in Paris at the end of 2015, energy efficiency and usage reduction is understandably a hot topic. However, what does this really mean from an energy management perspective for facilities management?
You may well be happy with your current energy supply, usage and back-up support, but how do you really know that this is operating as efficiently as it can be? With energy costs likely to form a huge proportion of complete operating costs, the central task of energy management is to reduce cost for energy provision without compromising on the work processes. The only way of truly identifying this is by conducting a survey out, at the outset, to ensure all relevant information and system characteristics are gathered. Without a detailed understanding of an entire environment and what it is trying to achieve, it is very difficult to identify if a supply, with its associated load types, is even viable for power quality improvements.
An effective survey will explore energy efficiency, conduct load or harmonic surveys and complete power quality investigations to give a complete picture. For example, what are the types of loads and what percentage do they represent? This could include heating, ventilation and air conditioning (HVAC) requirements, determining transformer type and what the tap setting are, right the way through to the levels of harmonic current and voltage distortion and how they are impacting on energy costs. The list goes on, but only then with the right information in place, can the right type of action or equipment be identified to ensure it will give the best return, while also allowing for redundancy and built in headroom.
Ultimately, an effective energy management approach needs to be an integral part of facilities management and in fact an essential part of a company’s overall strategy. It needs to encompass critical decisions on energy investments, while avoiding energy risks. Whilst also being transparent about the total cost of ownership (TCO) of equipment and maximising operating efficiencies, energy usage and running costs.
As Martin Pearce, Sales Director at Critical Power says, “Practically for facilities management, effective energy management is about adopting a holistic approach using a combination of tactics. This includes; market analysis of current energy supply, combined with site surveys to determine inefficiencies (and potentially efficiencies!), while adopting a turnkey approach for any installation changes required, so the headache is taken away. However, it does not stop there, as it is important to minimise any downtime in the future by ensuring business continuity, through remote monitoring and regular service maintenance support.”
The likelihood is that energy management and efficiency issues will continue to proliferate as power demands increase and change. This is why it is so important that whatever the output from the climate conference in Paris, that businesses, particularly facilities management continue and in fact increase their focus on energy management. The pressure to address this will continue to be principally from a financial cost-saving perspective, however there is now likely to also be a shift in focus to it becoming more of an environmental one too.
