Property Management Select Digital Extra


t to meter?… a difficult question


during a refit and has been on 24/7 ever since! We use cable trace devices to make


sure the meter is reading what it should be.


The newer the building the better the


chance your record information is accurate and up to date although full validation should still be carried out on all circuits. Another potential problem which needs


careful consideration when installing sub metering is Health and Safety. We have strict method statements and risk assessments to enable us to carry out the majority of sub metering with minimal disruption, but be prepared for a request for a power shutdown as sometimes areas cannot be worked upon in a safe manner without full isolation. We overcame this issue with a


customer in the Financial Sector who had 24Hr business critical dealer and server rooms by timing the installation of the electrical sub meters with their annual Electrical Inspection when the building had a full shutdown. All our works within the critical areas were planned and completed within this timeframe leaving us able to complete the installation in normal working hours. Isolation is not necessary in most cases but it is worth noting if you do have critical systems.


monitor key stages in the installation and ultimately provide fully validated data. As most of your buildings will exist,


they will have undoubtedly undergone numerous refits and as a result may have inaccurate record drawings. In our experiences this can prove to be a basic but crucial error in the installation process. For example, it’s not good enough to


install a meter using an existing schematic as the only reference for what is connected to it. You may be happily looking at your lighting data operating perfectly only to discover that half of the lighting was relocated to another source


Monitoring and action So you’ve taken advice on what to meter and what not to meter and appointed a company to project manage the installation of the correct sub meters throughout you entire property portfolio. The work is now complete and you are now receiving the first tranche of energy data and information that’s been collected from your sites. In our experience, this is the point


where the sustainable benefits from the metering and monitoring project can go wrong. If you do not have a plan in place for the analysis, interpretation and actioning of the data, you may as well have not installed the meters in the first place. Just by installing meters will not deliver


you savings. It seems like an obvious point but you


would be surprised the amount of companies who spend thousands of pounds on metering infrastructure but nobody looks at it or uses the information generated by it! We ask a lot of people whether they have sub metering and when the answer is yes, a surprising amount of people cannot say where the information is or who uses it. Have a plan. Make sure you have a


team in place to look at the data and to provide you with the information you wanted in the first place. That team can be one engineer or 20 engineers depending on the amount of data, but the main thing is to plan this stage well in advance of installing the meters. If you don’t, any savings targeted


through overuse will be lost. As part of the project scope, we


encourage our customers to consider the ongoing support and assistance they or their team require to ensure they achieve the projected return on investment. We explore the options, data only, data and advice, or account management, where we not only provide the information; we provide personal contact to explain, advise and interpret the data. We also provide the services of mobile engineers to visit site locations to make adjustments or we can train your existing service team to carry out that work. The key issue is that action is taken. 60% of Elite’s turnover is from the retail


sector where large national retailers have embraced this technology over the past several years. Half of our customers have decided on a complete support service, the remaining 50% have opted for a combination of our support and advice coupled with their workforce. Either way we achieve the desired outcome of a fully managed monitoring system that delivers results.


In summary, there are potential pitfalls, but a successfully managed and monitored sub metering installation will give you the visibility and the control you need over your energy. Web: www.elitecontrolsolutions.com


www.pm-select.co.uk l july/august 2010 l Property Management Select l 53


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