All the hard work that energy services firms and facilities managers put into an audit or retro-commissioning projects would pay off even more handsomely if someone would pony up the dough for the more capital-intensive measures.    The problems right now:

• The people with the money don’t understand the data.
• The people with the money don’t trust the data.
• The people with the money can’t compare the results of the data to other investments.

Our CEO, Colin Davis, is helping to fix all of this.    Earlier this week,  he participated as a member of the working group  for the Investor Confidence Project being conducted by the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).  The goal of the Group is to set guidelines for standardizing the data and processes employed to quantify the energy efficiency gains associated with large building retrofit projects.  The Group is comprised of the Department of Energy,  EDF personnel, a number of large banks and insurance companies, and a handful of technology companies.   See the following paper for more information on this topic:  http://tinyurl.com/7erh44y.

As a former energy auditor,  Colin is uniquely qualified to bring to this discussion the real-world perspective of those field professionals on the front lines who mine the “energy efficiency gold”.  Our hope is that the picks and shovels they use in the future aren’t the clipboards, cameras, and tape recorders from the past, but mobile technology with software that prompts the building professional to collect the data in a consistent, accurate manner.    If the data is high quality and standardized at the source,  building owners are more likely to see the financial rewards of major building system upgrade projects– and financial institutions will have the confidence to open their pocketbooks to fund them.

Over the past few years,  state and local governments in the United States have started to require building owners to rate the energy performance of their facilities.  Similar mandates are widespread across the European Union, where the European Performance of Buildings Directive (EPBD) at minimum requires that these ratings are performed at the “point of transaction” – i.e., they must be conducted as a pre-requisite for any sale, lease, or lease renewal of a building.    However, a number of U.S. cities, such as San Francisco, Seattle, Austin, DC, and New York,  are insisting on a number of  more stringent requirements – making the automating of the  audit data collection and management process more critical in ensuring regulatory compliance.   kWhOURS believes that the tablet-based approach we offer through kW-Field makes this process faster, more accurate, and efficient.  Here are three examples of these enhanced requirements:   

Austin – Employing Benchmarking to Normalize Building Performance

Non-residential buildings and multi-family properties greater than 10 years old in Austin, Texas are required to conduct energy ratings  as mandated by Energy Conservation Audit and Disclosure Ordinance.  The Austin City Council employs this data to perform benchmarking across facilities.  Any “high energy-use building” that consumes energy at 150% of the average multi-family energy use per square foot must perform retrofits and implement other measures  within 18 months to reduce this metric to 110% of the established benchmark.   The expectation here goes beyond a mere reporting requirement satisfied through an audit.  It requires the collection of granular, accurate data needed to quantify results and take action. 

DC– Energy Ratings Required To Be Scheduled Across Specified Time Intervals

Traditionally, disclosure of energy performance data need only be made to to real estate transaction counterparties.   However, the Council of the District of Columbia passed the Clean and Affordable Energy Act of 2008, making DC the first municipality to require commercial building energy performance rating at scheduled intervals (rather than at the time of a transaction) and disclosure to the general public via their  public web site.   By 2013, all buildings greater 50,000 square feet must disclose benchmarking data annually.   We believe that retaining audit data over time in a standardized format is critical to satisfying this requirement.    Also, automating data collection in field minimizes the risk that building owners will include erroneous data in their public disclosure.

New York City– Energy Audits AND Retro-Commissioning Study Are Both Required

Local Law 87 of NYC”s Greener, Greater Buildings Plan requires all building over 50,000 square feet to file an Energy Eficiency Report.   This report, which is required every 10 years,  includes not only an ASHRAE Level II energy audit, but a retro-commissioning study of base building systems.  Such studies require a granular understanding of these systems to identify and correct their deficiencies – an understanding that is greatly enhanced by integrating all media describing building assets (notes, photos, audio files, floor plan mark-ups) and their perfromance.

Even if your firm doesn’t do business in these cities,  kWhOURS will bet you dollars to donuts that similar legislation and ever-more strigent requirements are coming to a city near you.    Don’t let a field walk-through process centered around clipboards, cameras, tape recorders and the remarkable yet limited memory bank of the typical energy auditor limit your ability to collect, integrate and manage the data required to help your clients meet these requirements.   A tablet-based data collection approach – coupled with comprehensive data standardization and reporting – will make meeting these mandates easier and more-cost effective.

A recent article on TechCrunch recently heralded the announcement that kWhOURS has been chosen to be among a select few participants in an intensive “boot camp” conducted by Greenstart, a San Francisco-based startup accelerator. (http://techcrunch.com/2012/02/15/greenstart-tightens-focus-goes-after-sexy-cleantech-startups/).  This three-month program features intensive coaching sessions provided by a veritable “who’s who” of prominent cleantech CEO/entrepreneurs and venture capitalists on topics ranging from managing customer growth to product design.   kWhOURS is in very exclusive company indeed – only five clean technology companies were selected from a nationwide pool of 152 applicants.   The selection committee cited an ability to make a large impact and a crucial need in the marketplace as the primary reasons why kWhOURS was honored accordingly (not to mention our stunning good looks).

Our selection points not only to the recognition of energy auditing software as a winning cleantech category, but to the ascension of start-ups focusing on the intersection of energy efficiency and IT.   As energy generators grapple with the implications of the drop in natural gas prices – and  hardware providers focusing on energy efficiency struggle to combat competitors receiving government subsidization overseas,   the investment community has ratcheted up its support of energy management software and SaaS providers to capitalize on the intensifying market traction and potential returns associated with this space.

Much to the delight of all of us at kWhOURS, Greenstart purports to make cleantech “sexy enough to attract investors”.   Whether any of this karma rubs off on our executive team is a subject of open debate. But we are indeed confident that our leaders will undoubtedly enjoy the weekly “red-eye” back to Boston for the next few months.  Fortified by Jet Blue snacks and the sound sleep afforded by those comfy reclining economy seats,  the team looks forward to accelerating the realization of its mission to make energy audits faster, more accurate, and more cost efficient through tablet-based technology and software-enabled improvements to audit processes.