Steve, before/after bar charts are my go-to for showing demand reduction impacts. Simple side-by-side comparison of monthly peaks. Really drives home the savings potential when you see those bars shrink.
Visual aids - charts and graphs that work
Pie charts for cost breakdowns work great too. Show them what percentage of their bill is demand charges vs energy vs taxes. Most clients have no idea demand is 60% of their costs until they see it visually.
Don't overlook simple tables with conditional formatting. Color-coded cells showing which months had unusual usage patterns. Sometimes a well-formatted table is more effective than a fancy chart.
These are all great suggestions. Leo, I never thought about scatter plots for temperature correlation. That could be really powerful for explaining seasonal rate impacts. Anyone have experience with power BI or other advanced visualization tools?
Steve, I've played with Tableau but honestly Excel does 90% of what we need. The key is keeping it simple and focused on the story you're trying to tell. Fancy doesn't always mean better when you're dealing with busy facility managers.
Time series line graphs for showing seasonal patterns. Especially useful for identifying summer demand spikes or winter heating load issues. I use 24 months of data when available to show the full cycle.
Working on improving my reports with better visual aids. What types of charts and graphs do you find most effective for presenting utility audit findings? I'm decent with Excel but always looking for ways to make the data more compelling visually.
Sam, those seasonal charts are gold. I also like scatter plots for showing the relationship between outdoor temperature and electric usage. Great for identifying HVAC efficiency issues or building envelope problems.