With summer heat pounding China, buildings are using extra energy to keep their occupants cool, but high fuel prices are costing companies more money than ever. Gerry McMahon is the director and founder of Facilities Analysis & Control Ltd, one of the top companies working in Greater China to help companies pinpoint energy wastage and optimize efficiency, and he's often called upon to verify the quality and performance of facilities and assist with energy cost reduction.
What are the commonest causes of building energy waste that you come across?
Poor design, installation, testing and commissioning of electro-mechanical building services equipment can all lead to poor performance, discomfort and inefficiency. Here in Asia, however, the most serious problems result from poor commissioning if equipment (usually air-conditioning plant). There seems to be a widespread lack of awareness here of the importance of testing and adjusting major systems, and of the major inefficiencies which can result from not addressing this crucial activity properly.
Unlike other parts of the world where fine-tuning of major air-conditioning systems is commonplace (and even mandatory in the United Kingdom and several U.S. states), here in Asia the importance of building commissioning is often totally overlooked. There are no governmental regulations requiring it, or engineering bodies to regulate and control it. This means that our major buildings routinely waste serious quantities of energy. The biggest frustration for us it that this waste — and the environmental damage it causes — are totally unnecessary and avoidable.
So, how do FAC differ from other specialists in the energy efficiency market?
Most companies in the market are usually trying to sell products which can be "bolted on" to augment or replace a building's inefficient plant. We differ from other consultants because, whereas they routinely try to persuade clients to purchase expensive new apparatus, we focus on the savings achievable by fine-tuning existing equipment, so the capital outlay is usually far lower — and paybacks far higher – in our case. Immediate savings of between 10 and 50 percent are commonplace.
In essence, we aim to provide four main benefits: financially, in the form of reduced energy bills; environmental benefits, in the form of reduced electricity generation and carbon emissions; enhanced workspace comfort from optimized and customized air-conditioning; lastly, we consider "invisible" benefits such as increased workforce productivity.
Let's deal with these one at a time.
First is financial. People need to know how much money we are talking about here. Needless energy waste in China's major buildings can be estimated in trillions of dollars. Trimming a significant proportion of this by simple adjustments can result in massive financial savings from a very modest initial outlay.
Second is environmental. Generating this wasted energy has grave effects upon the earth's resources. Not wasting energy means not burning the coal and oil we use to generate it. This means reduced carbon emissions and greenhouse gases. The result is the significant enhancement of our environment, cleaner air, and healthier people.
Next is comfort. Most people don't realize that fine-tuning their building's air conditioning systems produces increased rather than decreased comfort levels. The belief of many building managers that air-conditioning needs to be run flat out to keep staff happy is, quite frankly, a nonsense. The link between more efficient systems and enhanced occupant comfort is very real indeed.
Finally we must look at productivity. Greater workspace comfort equals happier staff, and happier staff make more money for their companies. Sickness and absenteeism decrease while profitability goes up.
All in all, these benefits represent a win-win situation for everyone, and represent an opportunity which we consider is far too important to ignore.
In real situations, what sort of benefits do companies realize when implementing some of these green, energy-efficient programs in China?
Whereas many people are aware of the need to get building energy use down, as I said earlier, there is a general ignorance of the extent to which a company can reduce their energy footprint by adjusting the major equipment serving their buildings. For example, there is a global financial house operating in Hong Kong whose current objective is a 2.5% reduction in building energy use. In our view, however, they ought to be aiming far higher than that. Using simple fundamental procedures with little capital outlay, they should be able to get at least a 10% reduction, and maybe as high as 20% or more.
That is not to say that the people concerned do not share our commitment to energy reduction. They do, and have demonstrated this by installing new, energy-efficient lighting systems throughout their building. However, partly due to a lack of awareness concerning what can be achieved by fine-tuning existing plant and equipment, air-conditioning systems wasting far more energy than the lighting were left as they were. In short, the building continues to waste vast quantities of energy (i.e millions of dollars per year) simply because its major equipment and the electronic systems which control it have not been properly measured, adjusted and optimized.
The effects of optimization are both dramatic and easy to achieve. For example, in one notable case, we enabled a client to save more than 1.2 million dollars in reduced electricity charges. The tests and adjustments which facilitated this saving took approximately twenty minutes of our time.
So, why don't more people know about Building Commissioning?
I know what you mean: with savings like this on offer, the most obvious question might be: "Why isn't everybody doing it?" Well, there are a number of factors affecting this issue.
Lack of awareness: we've touched on this earlier in the interview. Basically, not enough people know about the importance of building commissioning. We have made it our mission to raise awareness levels concerning the serious waste that routinely results from a lack of proper adjustment of plant and equipment. However, addressing the problem on a wholesale basis will require training.
Training: engineers routinely graduate from colleges and universities without having been taught the basic facts about building commissioning and its importance to energy consumption and the environment. Sadly, as things stand, most of them would be incapable of carrying out the crucial measurements and adjustments even if they wanted to, so a wide-ranging training program will be required to ensure that sufficient quantities of skilled engineers and technicians enter the market. Having said this, however, it should be noted that the relevant procedures are simple and easy to learn.
Face: interestingly, one of the biggest obstacles to implementing the procedures we suggest is quite often the people in charge of the facilities themselves. We routinely meet resistance from engineers whose main concern is: "what will my boss think about me if he finds out that this type of energy-saving technology has already existed for many years?" Therefore, to save face, engineers and facilities managers regularly resist implementing the measurements and adjustments that we advocate. Their bosses don't get to know about our ideas, and needless energy waste stays at the same serious levels.
Our response to concerns over loss of face is simple: if a doctor came up with a new cure for a serious disease, his patients wouldn't sue him because he didn't cure them ten years ago! This is a similar situation: regardless of what took place yesterday, it is what we can do today that is really important. The potential for achieving major savings via energy optimization should be looked at like a new "medicine," and embraced without thoughts of loss of face or embarrassment.
How are certification processes for buildings in Greater China currently being handled?
The current focus upon environmental-friendliness and the need to reduce energy use has led to the development of assessment methods by which developers and operators of major construction projects may attain formal "badges" attesting to their buildings' efficiency levels. In short, these "badges" represent a benchmark for the design, construction and operation of high performance green buildings.
Certifying assessors award points for various aspects of design and construction of a building, with credits also being awarded for testing and commissioning which further optimizes long-term energy use and running costs. In short, rack up enough points and you get your "green" badge. The more points you score, the higher the grading which your building receives.
We are already engaged on a number of projects applying for accreditation via U.S. Green Building Council LEED (China), GreenMark (Singapore) and HK-BEAM (Hong Kong). We are fully familiar with all the relevant requirements for attainment of efficiency "badges" and employ comprehensive processes encompassing the management of all relevant tasks, collation of data and submission of applications to the relevant accreditation body.
However, we would stress that it isn't just the "badge" which is important. Even with official approval, a building can still be needlessly inefficient if the equipment serving it is not adequately commissioned. Owners of large buildings should strive to ensure that all services and systems are adjusted to ensure that they use only essential quantities of energy, and no more.
