Trying to set up better benchmarking for my commercial clients here in Harrisburg and wondering if anyone's had good results with EPA's Energy Star Portfolio Manager. Specifically looking at office buildings and retail spaces. PPL Electric is pushing their commercial customers toward it but I'm not sure how accurate the peer comparisons are for Pennsylvania buildings. Worth the setup time or should I stick with my own spreadsheet benchmarks?
Anyone using Energy Star Portfolio Manager for benchmarking?
We've been using Portfolio Manager for about two years now here in New Orleans. It's pretty solid for office buildings but the retail benchmarks seem off for our market. Entergy customers are showing scores that don't match what I'm seeing in actual bills. The weather normalization helps though, especially with our crazy humidity swings. Takes about 30 minutes per building to set up initially.
Portfolio Manager works great for identifying outliers but don't rely on the scores as gospel. I caught a Huntsville client with TVA service that was showing a "good" Energy Star score of 75 but their actual kWh/sq ft was 40% higher than similar buildings. The benchmarking database seems to have some old or bad data mixed in. Use it as a starting point, not the final word.
Been using it for Cincinnati clients on Duke Energy Ohio. The commercial office benchmarks are decent but you need at least 12 months of clean data to get meaningful results. Watch out for buildings with unusual schedules or mixed use - the tool doesn't handle those well. I usually run Portfolio Manager alongside my own regional comparisons and split the difference.
Sylvia, definitely worth setting up. Just remember to adjust for your local utility rates and climate. Here in OKC with OG&E, I've found the cooling degree day adjustments don't quite match our actual usage patterns. But it's great for showing clients where they stand and convincing them to invest in efficiency upgrades. The automated benchmarking reports save me hours every month.