Retrocommissioning to Increase Your Building’s Performance


Retrocommissioning to Increase Your Building’s Performance
 
All buildings need periodic maintenance and adjustments to ensure that all systems are working as well as they can. Retrocommissioning (RCx) is a process to identify less-than-optimal performance in your building's equipment, lighting and control systems, and then make the necessary adjustments. In addition to the existing RCx program, a pilot retrocommissioning (RCx) program for small and medium buildings under 100,000 square-feet is now available. The pilot, called Analytics-Enabled RCx, pays for a  custom engineering investigation of the building in exchange for an owner’s commitment to implement measures with a payback of 1-year or less (this obligation is capped at 5% of the building’s electric bill.)
 
RCx investigations focus on identifying low-cost operational measures for building owners. Common measures include optimizing HVAC schedules, ensuring proper economizer function, and implementing reset strategies. Simply turning things off or down when not needed can save a lot of money! The hard part is identifying these measures, and so that’s why the program pays for the study. And since the measures optimize your existing equipment, capital projects are generally not within scope.
 
New analytic software tools make it possible for this program to bring RCx to buildings under 100,000 square feet. Interested owners can have direct access to the online software to monitor the ongoing performance of participating buildings.  To learn more, visit www.aercx.com or contact David Peery at 619-282-4636 or dpeery@peci.org. The program is administered by PECI through a contract awarded by PG&E.