How difficult can it be to put four puzzle pieces together? With a regular puzzle, a two year old could do it. In the building energy world, even the most skilful building and energy managers regularly fail at the task. As a result most buildings are operated well below their efficiency optimum. And it’s not for a lack of experience. Equipment is also not the issue – we have the technology in place today to design, build and operate highly efficient buildings, even without employing rocket science or black magic
So what then, is the issue? Simply speaking, it’s one of stakeholder engagement. But not the type of ‘stakeholder engagement’ that is typically referred to when it comes to behaviour change projects, and often limited to tenants. The stakeholders here span a much wider range. In an ideal scenario, the entire “building management stack” from landlords to building managers, FMs, contractors, consultants, energy providers and tenants would be engaged and aligned with one objective in mind: run the building as efficiently as possible, and generate benefits for everyone involved.
How can this be done, you ask? Just follow these three easy steps:
- Understand the core drivers and motivations of each stakeholder group, and how they can benefit from efficiently operated buildings
- Identify the data and information that is required to asses the operating performance of the building and manage it, including the data owners, data type and quality
- Bring it all together in a single platform that represents the ‘single version of the truth’, is hardware agnostic, enables easy sharing across stakeholders and, above all, delivers meaningful insights that ultimately drive building efficiency.
The good news is: the technology to do this exists today, the benefits are there for everyone and the business case works out. Let’s solve the puzzle together, shall we!
