Energy System Upgrades are Only Half the Story



Real Impacts on Our Environment



Commercial property owners are always looking for ways to enhance property values, reduce energy costs and attract quality tenants.  Washington Group Plaza in Boise, Idaho is a great example of what can be achieved with existing buildings when owners choose to incorporate an energy management strategy in addition to physical plant upgrades. 

Throughout the 2000’s utility-funded incentives and programs like the American Recovery & Reinvestment Act encouraged building and institutional owners throughout Idaho to make significant energy system upgrades.  Starting around 2005 the owners of Washington Group Plaza, worked with Idaho Power and others to make numerous upgrades to the heating, cooling, and electrical systems.  However, like many projects of the era, improvements at the 590,000 sf Washington Group Plaza were installed without the means to monitor or manage future energy usage. 

[It’s a bit like installing a new furnace and double-pane thermal windows while keeping the old, non-programmable thermostat.  You will save energy, but wouldn’t it be nice to have more control?]

Since 2010 CSHQA has been working with facilities management and onsite maintenance teams to design new energy management systems for two of the Washington Group buildings.  The intended purpose was to earn energy efficiency certifications.  After the required year of benchmarking – monitoring and verifying energy usage – both buildings received Energy Star ratings.  What the owner may not have expected was the additional and very sizeable savings in energy and operating costs:  In the first year the team saw a 41% reduction in electricity use for an annual savings of $360,000!

Short story:  Equipment alone is not enough.  Until CSHQA and the campus maintenance team could actively track power usage and adjust operations accordingly, part of the “program” savings were on paper only.  To realize FULL savings requires taking the next step to monitor and adjust building systems as they are actually used.  Hence, the second half of the story - the management strategy.  –