February 20, 2006—TIAX, a leading collaborative product and technology development firm, recently released a comprehensive report evaluating the energy savings that could be achieved in US commercial buildings from controls and diagnostics.
The report, “The Energy Impact of Commercial Building Controls and Performance Diagnostics: Market Characterization, Energy Impact of Building Faults and Energy Savings Potential,” was commissioned by the Department of Energy (DOE) and is one of several studies TIAX has conducted for the DOE on energy consumption and efficiency.
TIAX identified more than 100 faults found in commercial building HVAC, lighting, and water heating systems. Faults identified included duct leakage, HVAC and light systems left on when office space was unoccupied, and simple software programming errors. TIAX’s analysis found that as much as 20 percent of the energy consumed by commercial building HVAC and lighting systems could be wasted due to these faults.
The company then evaluated 10 current, new, and advanced building controls and diagnostics systems including optimal whole building control systems, packaged rooftop unit fault detection diagnostics, occupancy sensor-based lighting controls, building commissioning, and HVAC sensors. Diagnostics save energy by identifying energy-wasting faults to be fixed, while controls reduce energy consumption by improving the effectiveness and intelligence of building systems. TIAX concluded that applying a combination of these sophisticated controls and diagnostics to the entire commercial building stock could reduce HVAC and lighting energy consumption by approximately 40 percent on a national basis.
TIAX LLC (pronounced Ty-ax) is a leading collaborative product and technology development firm. The full report is available on the company’s Web site.
