Energy audits are an amazing tool for facility managers and building owners. They can provide the roadmap to reducing operating expenses by lowering utility bills, identifying actions that extend the life of your equipment, decreasing maintenance costs, maximizing ROI, and avoiding regulatory fines.

Our Commercial Energy Efficiency Audits

We do ASHREA Benchmarking as well as Level 1 Energy Audits. The American Society of Heating, Refrigerating, and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) outlines three different levels of energy audits. The audit levels differ based on how intensive they are and what type of outcome you can expect.

We have an experienced Electrical Engineer on staff that has cross trained as an Energy Manager that can help you find potential no-cost and low-cost energy conservation measures in commercial or institutional buildings.

Below is an overview of the different levels of audits that are available. Out service offering is maily focussed on Level 1 but we can perform Level 2 and 3 depending on the scope and location of the building. These level of audits will normally be recommended after doing a Level 1 audit. Levels 2 and 3 usually include some engineering design work as well as feasability studies to determining the cost and viability of the energy efficiency measures as they will usually be of a capital expenditure nature and be implemented over a longer time horizon. Project planning and management could be a mayor portion of this service and might be sub contracted out to other consulting engineers and or other advisors.

Level 1

The purpose of a Level 1 energy audit is to identify the rough potential for energy savings in a facility, and it includes benchmarking. A Level 1 audit also includes a list of recommended energy efficiency measures (EEMs), sometimes called energy conservation measures (ECMs), that outlines savings opportunities in the building.

Level 1 audits or a walk-through audits includes brief interviews with the facility staff, a review of utility bills and other relevant operating data, and a limited walkthrough of the building surveying its systems and operations. This audit will help building owners to determine how well the building is performing and serves as a baseline for measuring future improvements. It can also guide building owners on how best to prioritize energy-efficient projects or if further evaluation is needed.

Types of energy efficiency measures

The different types of EEMs are no-cost, low-cost or capital intensive. No-cost or low-cost measures are those that can be done within operating expense budgets (i.e. within the OpEx budget), without significant capital expense that requires more planning (CapEx budget).

• No-cost measures are projects that have no significant associated cost (except internal labor) and are often operations and maintenance (O&M) changes. These measures reduce energy usage and costs with no capital investment, except for the time and effort of the on-site maintenance personnel.
• Low-cost measures are projects with relatively small capital outlays. These measures significantly reduce energy consumption and costs while requiring relatively little capital investment.
• Capital intensive measures are projects with higher capital costs. These measures significantly reduce energy consumption and costs, but also require significant capital investment. “CapEx” projects typically are budgeted a fiscal year in advance.

EEM cost, savings and priorities in a level 1 audit are described as qualitative only (as opposed to quantitative). This means that their exact costs and savings are not required, and are described qualitatively as high, medium, or low. A Level 1 used to be referred to as a “walk-through” audit but that label was dropped in the ASHREA standard– it’s simply a “Level 1”.

Level 2

A Level 2 energy audit is what most people think of as an “energy audit.” Auditors spend more time on site to speak with facility staff, review drawings not previously provided and perform a detailed building survey.

The Level 2 report includes all of the information from the Level 1, plus a site-specific analysis of recommended EEMs, including expected implementation costs, expected savings, and economics (simple payback or simple ROI).

In addition, the Level 2 includes a summary of the building energy-using systems broken down by end use, its occupancy, historical billing data and observations.

Level 3

The Level 3 audit builds upon a Level 2, but expands on those recommendations to develop the recommendations into projects, and reduce risks associated with uncertainties.

For a Level 3, substantial projects are required to have vendor bids or cost estimates, and the analysis is expanded through measurement or modeling. The concept is to reduce investment risk by increasing precision around costs, savings and ensuring project feasibility.

A Level 3 audit is rarely requested directly by customers as a first step but is sometimes done as projects are developed following a Level 2. However, for some contractual vehicles such as performance contracts, a Level 3 may be required by the client as a means of increasing the due diligence around project viability and savings claims.