Demand Response

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Managing energy information is coming of age. Rather than having its I.D. checked at the door, it’s being welcomed as a full-fledged contributor to helping operate facilities more efficiently and reducing the percentage of energy as a component of a building’s overall cost per square foot. Energy information has always been with us and it goes to the heart of the axiom that you can’t manage what you don’t measure. That’s why we take readings on everything from feed and chill water and steam to electricity and gas. But the problem is that the readings, or raw data, more often than not have been logged and filed away, leaving little opportunity to manage the information. That’s changing. Volumes of electronic data finally can be easily and quickly reduced to useful, actionable information. Facility and energy managers and executives are finding that using this information develops intuitive knowledge that enables them to apply it more effectively to day-to-day operations. Before they know it, they experience an ‘energy epiphany’—they gain insight; they acquire energy intelligence. It’s the ability to create a competitive edge for their organization. Examples abound. One is the Cox Business Services Convention Center and Arena in Oklahoma City where I was powerhouse chief engineer. The facility is managed by Philadelphia-based SMG, the largest private facility management company in the world, controlling more than 1,300,000 entertainment seats worldwide and over nine million square feet of exhibit space. High electricity costs for a particular event affected the profit margin that facility management wanted to achieve. But in Oklahoma, electricity cannot be a line item cost to convention users, so each convention service, such as the kitchen, hall and other areas, became cost centers. We installed five meters and contracted with a Web-enabled energy information management service to monitor and analyze consumption at each cost center, then determined rental costs for each center based in part on their respective energy use. Energy information management empowered the convention center to protect its profit margin. In another instance during preparations for a concert, the facility set a peak demand of 3.34 MW for September 12th. Later that month on the morning of the 27th, the facility was operating at 95 percent capacity. Concerned about setting a new peak, the facility manager used the real time monitoring capability of their energy information management service to compare the facility’s load profile for the month and the real time readings from the revenue meters. He developed a strategy of raising the discharge temperature on the chilled water by four degrees, shifting air supply units and staggering the start up of other units, according to the current load. This action topped demand out at 3.15 MW and averted setting a new peak, saving more than $1,000 in energy costs. The facility saved an additional $2,000 by changing general operating procedures. Traditional practice had been to start a chiller before shutting down another chiller when rotating chillers. Real time meters that monitored the building’s four chillers helped track energy consumption during this procedure. The building’s load profile (Fig. 1). showed that a 15-minute interval separating the shutdown of one chiller and start-up of another one would reduce consumption and demand costs in excess of $2,000. This type of Web-enabled energy information management also is being integrated into another SMG-managed property, the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum on Long Island in New York City. The service includes load profile capabilities that enable facility managers at the 18,000-seat Coliseum to collect and manage precise load profile information and review up-to-date energy consumption data at any time from two revenue meters and 12 sub meters via the Internet. The rate tariff functionality and data mining tools that are part of the load profile service provide managers with a better handle on utility billing structures and leverage during rate renegotiation. Bottom line results are better cost control and reduced risk. In addition, as SMG-managed properties like the Cox and Nassau gain energy information management capabilities, the company can include them into its view of energy consumption enterprise-wide. That’s important because SMG is part of the Environmental Protection Agency’s Energy Star Partner program, which promotes comprehensive energy management as a way to protect the environment by preventing pollution and reducing energy costs as the incentive to participate. SMG selected Automated Energy, Inc. as its partner in the Energy Star program to help reduce utility costs at each of its facilities by at least five percent. With annual utility costs of about $50,000,000, that translates to a minimum $2,500,000 estimated savings. Besides convention centers and arenas, energy information management also is finding a home in office and retail complexes. At Plaza of the Americas, a two-tower Dallas, Texas retail and office complex, Web-enabled energy information load profile services are providing energy consumption to manage use, select and negotiate rate structures in a deregulated market and improve energy efficiency through changes in operating procedures. The complex is one of 16 commercial buildings in the portfolio of Trizec Properties, one of the largest, publicly traded commercial property investment companies in the U.S. More than 100 meters and tenant-owned sub meters track energy use for developing facility load profiles and accurately allocating costs. The load profile software’s rate tariff functionality and data mining tools identify energy-related cost-reduction opportunities. Companies like SMG and Trizec that have multiple facilities and multiple locations can aggregate those facilities’ loads for even more leverage during rate negotiations. Mixing and matching loads in ‘what if’ scenarios that managers can run with the energy information management service enables them to combine the load profiles they manage into higher volume “packages” that can qualify for lower rates. And this capability isn’t confined to commercial buildings. To capitalize on deregulation, a premier company in the oil and gas industry in Texas wanted to aggregate the loads of eight major facilities in the state that ranged in use from heavy industrial operations to office work. It requested the load profiles of those facilities from the utility and received spreadsheet data that wasn’t uniformly helpful. The company decided to develop its own accurate and timely information that would be readily accessible by a variety of personnel, but didn’t want to invest in software and hardware that would require ongoing maintenance, upgrades and training expenses. The company selected an easy-to-use Web-enabled energy information service, avoiding high initial costs and the problems of maintaining its own system. It quickly developed load profiles of each facility, and then combined them to earn more favorable rates. Company officials report that with deregulation, accurate and timely load profiles and watching rate structures they have cut utility bills by $1,500,000. As is often the case with good energy information management, the company also uses it to reduce operational expenses. In one case, a plant manager suggested that energy costs could be reduced through thermal storage and used the energy information to rationalize the project. Management gave the go ahead and the energy information service has validated the savings. Operational changes like this have saved a total of $400,000 in energy costs. In addition to controlling demand, Web-enabled energy information management can ensure accuracy of utility billing and charges from energy service companies. Three examples prove the point. First, a local utility bill for an office building in Tulsa showed an unusually high kW demand charge. Management contacted the utility and requested that the bill be reviewed. The utility responded that its meter reading and records indicated an accurate bill. Management pursued the matter, however, requesting that we compare the demand and consumption shown on the bill with that measured by the load profiler, which is available as part of the energy information service. Table 1 illustrates the customer’s consumption (kWh) cost, based on a block-use calculation. Further discussions with the utility identified a meter change-out during the billing period. Demand had been calculated from both the original and the new meters, essentially “double-counting” the demand used for the block-use calculation. Recognizing the mistake, the utility rebated $3,766.21 to the customer. Second, another customer asked for help in determining why their utility bills climbed higher than in the previous year. Could the weather be affecting the building’s HVAC load? Not according to the load profile which overlays ambient outside temperature over the facility’s demand profile. The load profile however, did show why. All the chillers were started at about 5 am each morning. In addition, comparing the current month’s bill with that for the same month the previous year identified a power factor penalty on the current bill—caused by starting all the chillers at the same time! We suggested that the customer start the chillers gradually and the next week’s load profile showed that soft starting the chillers indeed solved the problem and saved the customer about $600 annually. While energy information management is coming of age, some doors remain closed to it. Managers say that they can’t be strapped to a desk all day watching a computer monitor. I tell them they don’t have to be. They can wear a pager that will alert them automatically of any condition of which they want to be apprised. Successful energy information management services are point-and-click tools based on user-friendly, intuitive graphical interfaces. They are affordable and flex to fit a manager’s needs, whether it’s real time metering and submetering, or 24-hour data from a building meter. They are scalable and can accept and protect data from any meter. Many managers also believe that energy information is for deregulated areas only. It’s not. Aggregating loads to qualify for more favorable rate structures, improving operational procedures to cut energy expenses and verifying utility bill accuracy justify the relatively small service charges for Web-enabled energy information that can be accessed 24/7 from any Internet-connected computer in the world. In fact, it’s not a stretch to say that managers of medium to large facilities who are not using energy information are at a disadvantage and disadvantage their organizations as well. Fig 1
Starting one chiller before shutting down another spiked kWh demand (upper chart). A change in operating procedures that separated the shutdown of one chiller and the start up of another by 15minutes eliminated the spike—and potential higher demand charges.

Table 1
Calculating block use costs based on the an Automated Energy-produced load profile of the customer’s office building, compared to utility-billed costs, showed the customer had overpaid and was due a refund.