Ron from Columbus. Just started picking up church accounts and finding consistent problems. Churches have enormous peak demand during Sunday services and essentially nothing the rest of the week. The demand charge carries that Sunday peak through the entire month. The rate class is almost never optimized for this usage pattern. Is a church engagement a good opportunity?
Demand charges for a church — why they are so often wrong
Paul from Minneapolis. Churches are an excellent niche for exactly the reason you describe. The demand profile is extremely peaky and the clients are often not commercially sophisticated. They just pay whatever arrives.
Paul, the church I am looking at runs its HVAC full blast from about 8 AM to 1 PM Sunday and barely at all other times. The demand charge for last August was $1,200 on an 800-person sanctuary.
Paul again. That peak is driven by the HVAC startup and the lighting. If the church pre-cools on Saturday evening before the Sunday service the Sunday morning demand drops significantly. The overnight cooling spreads the load and reduces the peak substantially.
Dan from Cincinnati. I have suggested pre-cooling to several church clients and every facilities manager I told was amazed they had never thought of it. Simple operationally and can reduce demand by 20 to 30 percent.
Ron here. The church also has a large fellowship hall used for occasional events — weddings, receptions, fundraisers. Do those events contribute to the monthly peak demand or are they usually low-load relative to Sunday services?
Dan again. Depends on the event. A summer wedding reception with hundreds of guests running the kitchen and HVAC hard could rival or exceed a Sunday service peak. Worth asking the facilities team about event frequency and scale.