Many colleges and universities using Events2HVAC have sent us energy-savings results over the years. They have all been between 50 and 75 cents/square foot/year. But Western Carolina University (WCU) has set a record with their Health and Human Sciences Building – 81 cents/square foot/year!
The Health and Human Sciences Building at WCU is an all-electric building with its own chiller. Energy savings for the 1-year pilot of Events2HVAC was calculated using building electric meter data and comparing it to data from the previous 12 months.
Here is a summary of the energy-savings data for the building from October 2018 to October 2019, provided by David King, Energy Manager at WCU.
Initial Cost $ 5,013
Annual Savings $ 23,110 ($0.086/kWh)
Savings to Date $ 23,110
Simple payback 0.2 yrs
ROI 461.0%
Net - 20 Year Life Cycle $ 437,807
“Your product [Events2HVAC] is about 1/10 the cost of solar needed to generate the equivalent in savings. That’s pretty amazing!” (David King, WCU)
The Health and Human Sciences building is 159,000 square feet. But only 27 rooms in the building, or 28,444 square feet were controlled by Events2HVAC in this pilot – that’s just 18% of the building. Dividing the $23,110 savings by the 28,444 square feet controlled, you get 81 cents/square foot/year! But it doesn’t stop there. With 51 rooms on their Events2HVAC license, WCU can connect more rooms and save more energy next year.
King explained that the energy used during the pilot year was a 12% reduction from the previous year, even though only 18% of the building was controlled by Events2HVAC. The building is now Energy Star rated for an office building, which means energy use is at the 25th percentile compared to similar buildings.
WCU is using CollegeNet 25Live to schedule classes and events on campus and Automated Logic for HVAC control. Before implementing Events2HVAC, all rooms in the Health and Human Sciences Building were scheduled as occupied from 7am to 11pm. For the pilot, 27 rooms were controlled by Events2HVAC based on the individual room schedules in 25Live, while the other rooms stayed on the 7am to 11pm schedule.
In addition to classrooms and offices, the Health and Human Sciences Building houses an anatomy lab, campus data servers, multiple kitchen and fume hoods, and a physical therapy clinic with a hydrotherapy pool.