SmartZone

A new startup company called Honest Buildings is striving to heat up the competition between buildings to promote making more of them green. The company has created a web site which aggregates data from a variety of sources including public databases, building owners, and companies which provide green products and services to create transparency and go-to reference for green building information. Their ultimate vision is to create a site where potential building space lessors could compare buildings to find those with lower energy costs due to energy efficiency technologies used within them. They also aim to provide a system which enables building owners to distribute RFPs and contractors and service providers to respond them for energy efficiency projects such as installing building energy management systems.

It takes a team to solve energy efficiency problems. And the team members must be focused on energy efficiency so they have the products, knowledge, experience and interest to offer energy efficient products and services. Most tradespeople working today were trained to install products in the most cost effective way without consideration for long-term operating costs. But energy efficiency is all about long-term operating costs. So, if you and your tradesperson are just focused on his bill, you'll miss the big picture. The cheapest approach today may be the most costly in the long run.

Parking Lot Lights should be controlled better. Have you noticed how many parking lots are fully lit even when they are empty because the stores or offices are closed? And have you noticed how many parking lot lights are on at 5pm in the Fall when it is still daylight. These are obvious inefficiencies that can be solved by applying some thinking and technology.

Since many offices are unoccupied for up to 14 hours a day, why are their lights still on at 11pm on a Saturday night? They are serving no purpose for anyone at that hour – so why are they still burning bright? When you are out in the evening, notice how many offices are brightly lit when the parking lots are empty. Notice that the parking lots are still fully lit too; but that's the subject for another post. Back to the lit building....Some people try to explain it by telling me "Those are Night Lights". But, they should be called “Occupancy Lights”. The real purpose of these lights is to provide for basic lighting when the building is occupied. They provide basic fill lighting and light hallways to exits. So, again, why are they still on when the building is empty? This is so obviously silly; you can't help but wonder why. Why are we so blatantly wasteful? Is this waste really intentional or are we just en mass forgetful? Maybe we all just can't remember to turn the lights out. OK, I'm having a little fun here, but seriously folks?