A Real Life Example of How One Building Reduced Energy Consumption by over 30% in Ten Minutes

Within 10 minutes, the team decided to move the setpoint to between 74 to 78F effectively stopping fans in all the units from running continuously – and immediately reducing energy use.

One of the things we talk about at Embue is how our platform brings together the people who own, manage and work in multifamily apartment buildings to drive value throughout the property.

But what does that really mean?

Here’s an example:

We recently had a Stakeholder Meeting to onboard the team responsible for a new Embue-enabled building. The building, a 200-unit high rise just outside of Boston, recently had Embue’s whole building solution installed for control, intelligence, monitoring and automation throughout the property, from the central plant to the individual unit.

Representatives from the property owner, the management company and its site team were all on the call, along with the owner’s energy efficiency consultant.

Looking ahead, the control provided by the Embue platform will enable this building to participate in demand response programs that will help control energy use at high cost or demand times – or even getting paid by the grid.

First, the energy efficiency consultant reviewed the energy strategy for the attendees on the call. Then, representatives from the property owner and management team, who had used the Embue platform at other buildings, “grabbed the wheel” and started driving the system.

Through the Embue platform, the building had set point limits in place to prevent residents from trying to cool their apartments below 68F. The first thing they noticed was that the apartments weren’t able to cool down to the set point chosen by the resident.

Looking ahead, the control provided by the Embue platform will enable this building to participate in demand response programs that will help control energy use at high cost or demand times – or even getting paid by the grid.

Drilling down, here’s what they discovered:

Over the summer, some apartments had their cooling setpoints as low as 68F while others in the building had more reasonable cooling setpoints in the range of 74-78F. Unfortunately, those with ultra low setpoints were taxing the central cooling plant, which was unable to even keep those with reasonable setpoints comfortable. Meanwhile, the fan inside the cooling equipment in every resident’s apartment was running constantly, trying but failing to cool the apartment down. That causes huge energy waste when all the fan motors in the apartments are running at once.

Within 10 minutes, the team decided to change the cooling set point limit from a minimum of 68F to a minimum of 74F, which made all of the resident more comfortable, and resulted in the fans in all the units running only when needed — immediately reducing energy use.

Looking ahead, the control provided by the Embue platform will enable this building to participate in demand response programs that will help control energy use at high cost or demand times and even getting paid by the grid.

This is just one example of how Embue’s building intelligence helps owners and managers “get on the same page” and improve the overall efficiency of the building.

Stay tuned for more examples.