Energy Management Systems For Hospitals
In order to reduce energy usage in hospitals, many managers are looking at Energy Management Systems to control their energy usage.
An Energy Management System is important because it can measure energy usage on equipment, by department, by zone or by size of hospitals. If many hospitals are connected to the same energy management system, the users can compare energy usage by equipment type, facility size, operation time, location, energy cost etc.
By installing an energy management system the hospital can make use of this data by importing it into the Energy Star database..
Energy Star operates the national energy performance rating system, an analytical tool that allows healthcare managers to see just how efficient their facility is. The buildings physical characteristics and a years worth of utility data are inputted, generating an overall rating on a sliding scale of one to 100. The industry standard is at 50.
AUDITS AND MANAGEMENT
Commissioning is a full-scale energy audit, ensuring that all equipment is installed and working properly, and operating in synch. Factors such as excessive manual overrides, a lack of training on the energy management system, and heating and cooling utilities working against one another can dramatically increase expenditure. They can also be rectified with minimal capital outlay.
The energy management system will tell the users the following:
- What equipment is using the most energy
- What equipment is left on when not in use
- If HVAC and heating set-points are set correctly (sometimes heaters and AC units turn on at the same time and nobody realizes it)
- Energy usage by department
- Water usage
- Oil usage
- Electric usage
- Which hospitals are the most efficient (this will provide a standard when renovations occur)
- If energy saving equipment really is reducing energy costs
Many industries can benefit from energy monitoring because it is the cheapest and most cost effective way to reduce energy usage, which reduces the reliance on fossil fuels.
What Makes a Good Energy Management System ?
As financial resources become tighter, financial decision makers are required to manage the companys' budget even more effectively. Now more than ever, corporations are seeing the need to optimize their facilities. Still one of the most crucial areas is that is forgotten is main and sub-load energy management & tracking.
How Does it Work?
The Energy Management System by EG Energy Controls is a powerful M&T (monitoring & targeting) web based energy management software. The web based energy management software allows remote access to the crucial data for energy savings. The system is built to monitor the main load and up to 17 sub load metering devices within a facility to better detect energy leaks, provide benchmark reports, bill verification, and be alerted when abnormal energy usage occurs.
What Can Be Monitored?
Not only are electrical sub-loads monitored but as well propane/natural gas, oil, and water consumption for the facility. The consumption data can be compared to the utility bill for bill verification. As well, you have better control of determining the time of day the most usage has occurred and implement equipment or procedures to reduce the usage
Loads that can be monitored in a hospital:
- Lighting by department sector
- Equipment by department sector
- Water usage
- Oil usage
- Electric usage
- Natural gas usage
- HVAC units (will ensure that the systems are commissioned correctly and not operating when heaters operate)
- Chillers (will check A,B,C phases to ensure that the chiller is working correctly and has no pending failures)
Graphs & Charts
Graphing capabilities provide information such as daily, monthly, yearly trends and can be easy glanced over using various line chart, bar, or pie. The Energy Management System provides a graph overly to view different data over the same window for quick comparisons. A load profile of one store can be compared with another or benchmarking graph and report can be viewed when comparing the performance of new equipment.
Notification & Alerts
The energy management software is built to provide only the information required since facility energy managers and financial officers are focused on core responsibilities. Alerts and notifications can be setup to notify if loads are not running, if a load exceeds kWh usage, if loads are running outside operating hours. Many other notification & alert conditions can be easily customized with the software through an easy to use application on the computer
Example of notification alerts:
- Pending equipment failure
- Lights or equipment left on (outside of operational hours)
- Heaters operating at the same time as air conditioners
- Set points for the HVAC system set outside of normal parameters
- Too much water usage (possible leaks)
- Too much electricity usage (possible overbilling from the utility)
- Too much fossil fuel usage (employees not being careful with energy usage)
- Facility is using more energy than others in its class
by: Jeremy Peters
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