- Key Performance Indicators
- Circular Economy
- Climate Change
- Climate Change
- Utility Transformations
- Utility Transformations
KPIs Essential to Managing Energy Efficiency, Sustainability
Influenced by initiatives such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, stakeholders in sustainable energy and environmentally conscious professionals gathered in May for the Environmental Leader and Energy Management Conference at the Tech Center in Denver, Colorado. The conference represented a nexus of industry leaders eager to explore trends and share best practices and solutions to some of the biggest energy challenges businesses face today. Along with maintaining a competitive advantage, other economic trends for sustainable energy that were explored by the conference included:
- Establishing baselines for managing energy efficiency
- Building a business case for monitoring energy use and Internet of Things (IoT) by establishing benchmarks
- Understanding how energy is being used and possibly wasted through key performance indicators (KPIs)
- Partnering to achieve sustainability goals through mission driven strategies
- Understanding the circular economy and tracking the supply chain for designing sustainability
Do Not Underestimate the Importance of KPIs
These trends, among other topics, were discussed during multiple workshops and plenary sessions over the course of 3 days. I attended the first day of the conference, which included talks led by the US Department of Energy, Tesla, and National Renewable Energy Lab, to name a few. Several sessions emphasized the importance of establishing baselines and determining KPIs for managing energy efficiency and sustainability. Key takeaways from these talks included understanding what constitutes a quality KPI, realizing how KPIs can negatively impact a company, and realizing that not everyone uses the same metric for measuring efficiency.
Although businesses may have common end goals, the means to those ends can vary widely as strategy plays a fundamental role in determining the success of a company. Part of that strategy involves setting the right benchmarks and using the right metrics. For managers of generation, it’s important to be clear about their goals in order to understand which benchmark to optimize. In his plenary presentation, Tim Ritchie from Buddy Platform explained that the business case for IoT is built on finding the right benchmark. His firm’s Buddy Ohm is one such product that can monitor critical systems and reduce energy inputs. Understanding baseline energy use is crucial for developing meaningful KPIs and effectively targeting underperforming areas.
Companies Turn to IoT
As IoT is heralding a new age for commercial buildings, energy companies today are turning to IoT technology to monitor and reduce energy use and resource consumption. IoT is starting to unlock value for smarter commercial buildings, which is helping to connect aggregators of data for managing and processing information and provide real-time insights. These solutions offer non-energy benefits as well, such as occupancy health and satisfaction, enabling scalability and optimization for customers.