Sub Metering and the CRC

Unless the new Con-Dem coalition decide to abolish it, the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme (CRC) is soon going to be a reality. A (hopefully atypical) law firm approach to the CRC might be:

1. Facilities manager goes on a seminar and finds out that big companies might get taxed on how much electricity they use! FM measures usage and works out carbon footprint from electricity and gas bills to see if firm is affected (as yet FM has no real idea whether 10,000 tonnes of carbon is good or bad, but it sounds bad). FM told there will be a league table, based on energy usage reductions, and you’ll get your money back if you are near the top of it. FM then decides not to do anything. They’d prefer to give themselves some leeway to make improvements once the scheme starts.
2. Senior partner sends someone to a seminar about the CRC. They report back: “It’s a league table!” Senior Partner tells everyone solemnly that he wants to be top of it (or at least above that lot across the road).
3. Fee earners hear about the CRC from someone in business development who went to a seminar. They read about it very quickly. They are now qualified to explain the ever-changing obligations to frightened clients, who got an email from someone who had been to a seminar and have been worrying about the CRC ever since.
4. Finance directors hear about the CRC from someone who went on a seminar. All they know is that this is going to cost them. Optimistic FD’s ask the facilities manager for a best case scenario and budget for some energy saving improvements. Pessimistic FD’s ask the facilities manager for a worst case scenario and then budget for some contingency funds. Realistic FD’s budget to do both. Really switched on FD’s get together with their facilities managers and invest in metering.

Actually, really, really switched-on managers have been thinking about metering for ages. It’s the only effective way of measuring consumption, identifying anomalous usage, and seeing, verifying (and boasting about) the effective changes you have made. The CRC offers a 5% reduction on costs for having basic half hourly meters as the main electricity meter. But give us techie types an idea and see how many pieces of kit and bits of software we can bolt onto it.

I asked our energy manager, Jamie Ayers, to explain how metering has made a difference, and how submetering has made a big difference:

'Initially we used half hourly data collated by our energy supplier from the main meter to find defects and monitor the results of changes. We spoke to them and they simply put the data on a website for us. The data was a day old by the time we looked at it, but that’s already better than a month old data from bills, and we could drag it into Microsoft Excel and make a graph. It proved effective in the short term. We looked at the buildings’ energy profile to determine when the energy was being used.'

'So if this was working well and qualifies for the CRC, (apart from an engineers love of new electronic kit), what prompted you to install more meters?'

'Whilst the half hourly data gives some understanding of the building’s energy use, it does not allow the user to understand by what piece of equipment or in what area of the building the energy is being consumed, this is the role of the sub meter.

'ICT Energy installed 125 “RTU+32 V6” sub meters. These can give readings at 1 to 6 minutes, 10 minute, 12, 15, 20, 30 or 60 minute intervals. We can see a piece of plant ramp up or wind down in response to a clock or an event, and compare different bits of plant to see what is running contiguously. With 125 meters we can monitor by plant type, core, and/or building floor and also monitor unusual energy profile spaces such as server rooms and copy rooms.

'Using the EIServer7 software, our 125 meters can be combined to create ‘virtual meters’ for analysis by summing their outputs. This enables the user to amalgamate the usage of similar pieces of equipment to give an understanding of the usage of a system, a floor or even a particular practice group.'

Watch out lawyers! Your energy manager might soon be able to tell if you’re really working the hours you’re billing!

'So do you just sit in front of a screen all day long watching out for abnormal energy use?'

'Not exactly. The trick is to establish a true baseline. Then any abnormal variance from that base line, either up or down, can be investigated to determine the cause'

'So you just plug in the meters and away you go?'

'We encountered some challenges during the installation progress. Firstly meters are invasive. You can get meters to clamp onto cables but really you want the meter to be reliable and that means shutting down a circuit to install it. In any law firm it can be difficult to get permission to do this. No one ever wants to switch off anything (especially IT). So maybe get one meter done, and then show the partners a graph with how much energy they’re wasting, and they might grant you permission to put in more meters.

'We also had some miscommunication between the Premises and IT department at the start. It’s important that Premises and IT work together from the projects inception through to completion. The head end of the system is a standalone computer that is taking data from digital meters dotted all over the building. That will mean either (a) a lot of cabling and signal boosters, (b) installing wireless technology, or (c) patching the meter data feeds into your existing communications network. Whichever one you do, you’ll really need IT to buy in. So maybe the first meter you do is the one on a PDU in your computer room?'

'So was it all worth it?'

'Although the project was only recently completed, we are already investigating anomalies that we would never have spotted without it. I can conservatively say that this kit will pay for itself in less than three years in direct energy savings. Too often people come in, make a few changes, save a few quid and then everyone forgets about it. So the real benefit is in maintaining the savings and standards that you’ve worked so hard for.'

Stacey Collins is a Health, Safety and Environment manager at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP.