Why make your building or office sustainable?
These strict rules do not yet apply to existing buildings, although there too the requirements are becoming increasingly stringent. Energy-saving requirements are expected to increase further in the coming years.
But by making your building more sustainable, you are not only complying with regulations. Sustainable property has more value and it retains its value longer. Market research shows that, on average, a sustainable property has about 10% more market value and rental income than non-sustainable property. It is obvious that the difference in value between 'green' and 'brown' property will only increase in the coming years.
Moreover, a sustainable office or building not only saves energy. It also increases user comfort. Increased well-being results in better performance, less stress, lower absenteeism and more satisfied employees. Thus, the sustainability of a building also helps you find and retain good staff and win 'the war for talent'.
The basis of a sustainable building: Trias Energetica
Obviously, making your office or business premises sustainable is very important for several reasons. But how do you approach making your property sustainable? Based on Trias Energetica, there are three steps in making a building more sustainable:
- Reduce energy consumption by insulating the outer shell and building as compact as possible;
- Make maximum use of energy from renewable sources, such as wind or solar energy;
- To meet the remaining energy needs, use (fossil) energy sources as efficiently as possible.
7 tips for making your office or business more sustainable
The first two points of the Trias Energetica are pretty clear. Insulate your building as well as possible and use solar panels or a solar water heater to provide (a large part of) your building's energy needs. But especially on the last point, saving energy, it is often with simple interventions and good building management that big gains can be made in making an office or commercial building more sustainable. Therefore, below we provide 7 tips to make your building more sustainable and save energy.
1. Understanding your energy use
Good insight into energy consumption is a prerequisite for saving energy, for example with Priva Energy Insight by ErbisOne or the Priva EBS tool. Good energy monitoring makes patterns and deviations visible. By responding to these, you save energy immediately. In addition, you can see where the biggest gains can be made with energy-saving measures.
2. Adjust systems to usage
For example, switch off lights when nobody is present and minimize heating, cooling and ventilation. Did you know that around three quarters of offices are simply 'on' at weekends and during holidays? A waste of money and energy.
3. Use space efficiently
Following on from the above, even when the building is in use, you can use the space and the climate system as efficiently as possible. For example, sensors measure whether a space is in use and adjust building management accordingly.
4. Make optimal use of sunlight and solar heat
The sun lights and heats a building without consuming energy, but on hot days a building can also heat up too much. Smart, automatic control of solar shading with sensors for e.g. temperature and light intensity saves a lot of energy.
5. Optimize the system with (historical) data
Use the information collected by sensors and systems to optimize building management and link systems to this data with APIs to make them more compatible.
6. Avoid peaks in energy consumption
By cleverly distributing energy use across the day and the different systems with a smart microgrid, you reduce peak loads. For instance, the part of the day with the lowest energy consumption is a good time to charge electric cars. This way, you get rid of the peaks, a lower connection capacity suffices and you pay less fixed charge.
7. Let your systems predict rather than react
Smart software can analyze data from your building automation and predict future consumption based on it. Controlling your air conditioning based on the weather forecast and expected usage saves a lot of energy.
