Green Has Become a Business Tool rather than an Environmental Solution
Today’s green buildings are becoming complicated with talk of CO2 control, green roofs, rainwater harvesting. Becoming green is now the trend but we believe simplicty provide better environmental benefits compared to complicated, high cost, high carbon emission type of solutions.
The trend setting and popular “New Building” culture where architects, engineers and all others seem to suddenly have technology and the know how to build efficient buildings lays the basis on a pertinent question: Why was the design of buildings not efficient earlier? It is not new technology - efficient chiller under 0.52 kW/ton were readily available in the late 90s, high efficiency motors and pumps were also available and AHUs with low face velocity was already part of design concepts used by ESCOs that knew about efficiency from design.
Performance based contracts were already in place in the early 90s in Malaysia (between Universiti Teknologi Malaysia and Institute Sultan Iskandar) where monitoring and consistent performance was required, thus assuring sustainable savings.
You will be surprised to know that we have been designing efficient systems since early 2000 and our engineers have experienced such design as early as 1998. We have been making cleanrooms, hotels, data centers and commercial buildings operate at reduced energy levels without compromising comfort, requirements and quality.
Our designs have always emphasized on creating systems and not just a part of an equipment and Indoor Air Quality is on top of the list of compliance in our list of targets. For us, IAQ takes the precedence and than energy efficiency is put in place. This is necessary as toying with temperature settings and readjusting fresh air flow to conserve (read : CONSERVE - not efficiency) creates imbalance in the system.
Sometimes a rainwater harvesting system may use more carbon to build and less rain to harvest! Cost increases due to higher sensor requirements which also translates into higher maintenance cost... get the picture? Going green without considering the big picture can be a costly affair. AND REMEMBER, the picture can change as technology and requirement changes!
As such, we always ask our clients - Do you wish to target efficiency improvement or just to cut cost without considering the overall system? If the answer is the former, we start a fruitful partnership, if the latter is the answer, we part our ways - why? Because at Energy IR our integrity, vision and mission are adhered to at all times. We do not wish to take on projects where owners are not concerned on the overall performance of a system and just want to reduce cost but create imbalances in a system. We wish to engage our clients on the road to efficiency together. Why? Simply because we believe projects turn into sustainable partneships