Energy Strategies Can Help With Tough Decisions
The Greek word for energy equates roughly with the Greek word for challenge. That juxtaposition also captures how educational institutions must deal with energy issues in an uncertain and ever-changing world.
Facing diverse missions, educational institutions must provide comprehensive, economical, uninterrupted energy to a substantial permanent population as well as to a significant transient population.
Facilities and structures differ greatly in size, scope and mission from campus to campus, institution to institution and system to system. In addition, institutions are rarely, if ever, built at one time from the ground up, so administrators, engineers, planners and maintenance workers must incorporate and manage technology, structures and equipment that have been cobbled together over several generations.
There are also political and environmental issues that must be factored into nearly all decision-making, and there are always funding issues.
Though each institution must carve out its own solution, specific principles and strategies can guide administrators and other key personnel in making tough decisions.
A Jolt of Awareness
Without exception, every large campus or system should have an energy information technology infrastructure in place. As the adage goes, you can’t manage it if you don’t measure it.
Every energy input at each building should be metered and measured, collected and analyzed. Every building, and the campus as a whole, should have a detailed time-of-use database of electricity, natural gas, chilled water, hot water or steam, and any other type of energy use.
The data allows facility operators to benchmark their facilities against similar buildings and against state-of-the-art buildings. It also allows them to identify buildings that are particularly heavy energy users and earmark them as priority targets for energy-efficiency measures.
Establishing benchmarks enables accurate measurement of progress toward achieving efficiency goals. These measures can be translated into dollars saved or carbon footprint reduction, depending on the objective. These measures are essential to starting an energy program on a realistic foundation.
Everything Old is New Again
The most efficient dollar saved is one never spent. The same is true for energy usage. Turn things off. Create and enforce a program to regularly remind end-users to turn off lighting and equipment when it is not in use. Several inexpensive energy control devices can be installed to automate the process.
Recommissioning a facility can also generate energy efficiency. Recommis-sioning begins with the careful examination of a building to determine how its systems are operating versus how the systems are supposed to operate according to design specifications.
Once you know how building systems are performing, they can be restored to their original condition and sequence of operation.
It is common for temperature settings to be overridden, heating and cooling sequences to stray out of specification and equipment operating schedules to run out of control. Such occurrences can increase energy usage by 10 percent or more. Regular building recommissioning can provide significant energy and cost savings.
Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail
A piecemeal approach to an energy agenda can be somewhat effective, but virtually every institution can benefit from an energy master plan.
An energy master plan is a comprehensive strategy for energy use and savings that contains several key features. A master plan includes benchmarking existing energy use and a self-examination process that helps establish strategic priorities. Another key element is to set realistic but aggressive energy-efficiency goals.
Although often expressed as a percentage reduction in absolute terms, actual energy efficiency goals are much more subtle and complex.
If a campus is expanding, it may not be feasible to prescribe an absolute reduction in overall energy use. It may be more realistic to aim for an aggressive reduction in energy use per student or per square foot of building area. This may sound like a semantic distinction, but it’s not. Barring sheer luck, no strategy can be truly effective if it does not set realistic goals using meaningful parameters that can be accurately measured.
Once aggressive, yet obtainable energy-efficiency goals are established, develop a timeline to meet them. Use LEED for Existing Buildings or Energy Star guidelines as appropriate.
There are several factors to consider: What no-cost or low-cost measures are available? Which items require capital dollars and some engineering and design, but can be handled internally? What items are major, whole-building retrofits that require new or renovated central energy plants for heating, cooling and on-site electricity generation? Are there alternative energy possibilities such as solar power? Obviously, the latter items require significant amounts of capital and engineering resources.
Every strategy must include a financial component: Where will the money come from? What is the criteria for investment? What are the long-term implications? There may be an opportunity to dramatically cut energy use, but it might carry a payback term of 30 years. Can your institution afford to wait that long?
Consider using a life-cycle cost analysis instead of simple paybacks to evaluate technologies. Each campus must find that sweet spot where its strategy is aggressive but financially acceptable. When considering long-term results, remember that institutions outlast administrations. Your strategy must fit the institution’s future needs.
No Plant Is an Island
No one knows your institution and its physical plant better than the people who work at your facility every day. They should be listened to, respected and made part of the planning team.
However, sometimes it is advantageous to seek outside help for another perspective. Remember, campus facility staff have full-time jobs and cannot, by virtue of their workload, be fully versed in every available technology and every energy industry development.
An external partner brings this perspective to bear, as well as in-depth experience and best practices garnered from hundreds or even thousands of projects. Also, in today’s ever-changing landscape, outside entities can help provide access to potential partners and capital. A significant number of campuses today are finding willing partners for on-site energy generation.
Educational institutions have unique requirements. Few other entities must wrestle with such an unusual combination of needs and requirements, and equally diverse structures and facilities.
Remember, challenges present opportunities and by following effective energy strategies, educational institutions can strategically optimize their energy use and efficiency.
Lucy Labruzzo is the vice president of the energy practice at DMJM Harris AECOM.