Empowering Owner-Operators of Small and Medium Commercial Buildings to Identify Energy Retrofit Opportunities

Fernanda Cruz Rios, Sulaiman Al Sultan, Oswald Chong and Kristen Parrish ()
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Fernanda Cruz Rios: Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering, Drexel University, Philadelphia, PA 19104, USA
Sulaiman Al Sultan: School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA
Oswald Chong: School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA
Kristen Parrish: School of Sustainable Engineering and the Built Environment, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA

Energies, 2023, vol. 16, issue 17, 1-20

Abstract: Small and medium commercial buildings account for nearly half of the energy consumed by commercial buildings in the United States. While energy retrofits can significantly reduce building energy consumption, buildings’ owners often lack the capital and experience to perform detailed energy audits and retrofit assessments. The purpose of this paper is to introduce a low-investment, bottom-up and simplified methodology for identifying energy retrofit opportunities that benefit the owners of small and medium sized office buildings In particular, the paper addresses small and medium commercial buildings on a university campus as a proof-of-concept for other owner-operators that have small and medium commercial facilities in their portfolio. The methodology consists of an eight-step framework using publicly-available and simplified tools. While energy audits and retrofit opportunity assessments are not new, a low-cost methodology for owner-operators of small and medium commercial buildings to analyze energy consumption and identify retrofit opportunities represents a contribution to knowledge. A medium office building on a university campus in Arizona served as a case study to validate the methodology. The case study showed a maximum potential energy reduction of an estimated 50%, but the figure varies based on the types of retrofit (deep versus light), energy conservation measures selected and implemented, invested resources, and interactive effects between measures. This methodology is extensible to other owner-operators that have building utility data and would like to perform retrofit opportunity assessments themselves.

Keywords: energy efficiency; small commercial buildings; retrofit (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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