How AHU systems reduce energy costs and help building sustainability

Why energy bills and prices are increasing and how HVAC systems mitigate the costs

Why in 2022 the energy bills and costs are increasing

In the last few months of 2021, we all have experienced an annoying rise in price for electricity and gas and the trend seems to continue for the entire 2022. What impresses the most of this price increase is its dimension: according to BBC, the price of gas and electricity soared in the UK, Europe and Asia by 70% from August 2021.

Where does this growth of energy costs come from? 

It seems that the wholesale price of energy has been increasing for the entire 2021 and, when the autumn season was about to come, the gas and electricity providers started increasing their prices in order to pass the cost that they were facing to the final consumers.

Why are electricity prices going up in 2022?

The new scenario has been generated by a combination of different events that hit the demand and supply chain:

The winter between 2020 and 2021, in Europe, has been tougher than expected and required a higher supply of electricity and gas, this led to a current lack of stored resources to face the following months.

Also, Asia experienced hot weather that pushed the use of air conditioners, meanwhile, the export of gas from Russia towards Europe has slowed down.

The lockdowns due to covid-19 did their part as well, requiring some maintenance work at the supply level from 2020 to 2021.

Why the building efficiency and sustainability is important

What can we do to mitigate the energy crisis we are facing now? Many businesses have already started raising their prices and inflation appears to rocket. 

As consumers, everyone has the chance to rethink the way to use the energy in their offices and houses, optimising building efficiency and sustainability.

What is building efficiency and sustainability?

In a few words, building efficiency and sustainability is related to the capacity, in a building system, to manage the resources, like energy and water, to effectively and efficiently furnish services as, for example, heating, cooling and ventilation.

How an HVAC system has a key role in the building efficiency

Most of the services that an office or house provide are supported by the HVAC system, and starting optimase all its components and activities are the first step to reduce the energy required. The energy waste, indeed, is often due to parts of the HVAC that do not work as expected. Also, the use of specific solutions are a viable solution to contain energy costs, an example is the application of adiabatic humidification, a solution that requires a lower level of energy than isothermal humidification.

How the AHU systems and building management systems (BMS) help you monitor energy consumption and ease building sustainability

The consumption of energy used for the ventilation and air handling activities can be handled by monitoring the activities of the AHU controller that runs the entire AHU system. 

This is feasible especially when the programming controller is connected to a building management system (BMS). The latest BMS versions, indeed, when they manage all the controllers, are able to monitor all the values of the air such as temperature, pressure, levels of CO2 and air quality. 

Following the current state of the indoor environment, the BMS is then able to modulate the activities of the HVAC system and save a considerable amount of energy. 

The constant focus on the levels of energy used to run an office or a house is then the solution that a AHU system run by a BMS provides to reduce energy consumption and make the building more efficient.

How the Butterfly valves increase the energy efficiency of your AHU and HVAC systems

Picking the right type of devices for your AHU system is a key moment to build an efficient solution from the foundation. The AHU valves, as an example, are those parts that consume a consistent amount of energy to complete their tasks: deciding the AHU valve with a sustainable power consumption is relevant to reduce costs. The Butterfly valves are designed for HVAC systems, provide consistent control of high flow control and use a sustainable amount of energy, which makes them extremely convenient.

Explore our range of butterfly valves from Belimo and Siemens.

How the actuators influence AHU efficiency and building sustainability

The AHU actuators have an impact on the energy efficiency of commercial ventilation and AHU systems as much as the valves. Belimo has developed an innovative range of actuators that assure high levels of performance at a low power consumption. 

3 tips to reduce costs of your HVAC and Air handling system

When the AHU system has been set up, we can contain the energy costs by following a few tips to reduce the energy consumption required to make the HVAC application working:

Contain unnecessary energy consumption by regularly cleaning and changing the filters of the HVAC application.

As already mentioned here, the HVAC solutions are often obstructed by the state of the filters as they can get dirty easily and block the activity of the entire application.

Install programmable thermostats 

Setting the temperature in an environment by using a programmable thermostat is the best way to customise the required values and avoid wasting unnecessary energy.

Run regular maintenance check-ups to assure HVAC and AHU performances

Usually, the companies do maintenance to their commercial AHU and ventilation applications when there is an incident or some HVAC part stops working because it is damaged or old. This approach leads the companies to face higher costs, however, a planned maintenance done over the time helps to find in advance potential issues that could increase power consumption.

Conclusion

In this article, we have been through the main possible causes that led to an increase of energy consumption and wrap up a few suggestions on how to increase the efficiency of your building. The final advice would be to always ask support to HVAC professionals, here at IACS we provide AHU controls and rely on more than 10 years of experience to build HVAC efficient solutions capable of monitoring and controlling energy consumption. Leave here a comment to share your thoughts and experience!