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Create eco buildings for your customers
With more efficient pump solutions, the world’s energy consumption can be heavily reduced. The result of which is not only a positive impact on climate change and global emissions. It’s higher performing buildings, greater indoor comfort and increased water safety.
Why should we transition to eco buildings?
To combat global warming, global emissions need to halve by 2030
As the pace of urbanisation increases, so too does the world’s energy expenditure, energy demand and rate of emissions. Pumps currently account for 10% of the world’s electricity consumption which means that how we use water has huge energy saving potential.
The global cooling demand has doubled in less than 20 years
Global use of energy is projected to increase almost 25% by 2050. And in the past 20 years, global cooling demand has nearly doubled. It makes energy conservation important as we move to renewable energy and think about energy saving and building energy efficiency.
In commercial buildings, HVAC accounts for up to 40% total energy use
As both end-users and governments demand more efficiency, HVAC systems must be continuously optimised to limit building energy costs, reduce consumption and lower emissions. Yet HVAC currently accounts for up to 40% of total energy use in buildings.
Improve building energy efficiency and reduce cost in HVAC systems
HVAC systems account for 40% of total energy use in buildings. Efficient buildings are crucial ways to keep costs down and energy consumption low. Grundfos iSolutions offers a wide range of intelligent products that decrease system complexity but also reduce operating cost without sacrificing end-user comfort.
Watch the video to learn more about Grundfos iSolutions for HVAC systems.
Creating energy efficient buildings: the challenges you might face
Commercial buildings today are expected to perform well throughout their entire lives. This is despite the fact that HVAC systems in buildings can be highly complex as they are often made up of many standalone components. These need to work together in an integrated way, but it is often the case that when one part fails, the whole system stops working and commercial building energy consumption can sharply increase.
When designers work on these complex systems, they are often working under huge time pressures. This can get the project completed quickly, but it also greatly increases the risk of design faults. In addition, the pumps themselves are often oversized and running at peak load, so they might be overperforming compared to the demand placed on them. This means many HVAC systems are already inefficient and consuming huge amounts of energy before things even go wrong. Building energy efficiency is compromised from the start.
The commissioning and integration of components and solutions to a BMS system are the final activities needed before putting a HVAC system into operation and handing it over to the end user. This is also when mistakes can occur. A need to complete the project quickly, poor training and a lack of staff can mean that work is done quickly and not checked properly. Even if the engineers are following the rules, the manuals for components or solutions might not offer updated advice for how the HVAC system will be used.
Many prioritise CAPEX more than OPEX during design and installation. This can lead to increased building energy consumption over time as pumps may be running without controls or operated in control modes that are not energy saving. This may result in problems with Delta T and might mean that a building’s actual energy use is very different from what the designer said. If you combine all these factors with the fact the system is ageing, it will inevitably lead to poor indoor climates and low end-user satisfaction.
How you can optimise
Today, 10% of the world’s electricity is consumed by pumps. But if everybody switched to high-efficiency pump systems, the world could take 4% off this figure. This is why deciding to optimize HVAC systems in the creation of eco buildings is significant way of starting to combat global climate change.
It is also a way to reduce system complexity and operating costs while increasing asset value and end-user comfort. System components in energy efficient buildings need to work as one, creating an ecosystem of efficient solutions, which are easy to install and commission, and work reliably throughout a building’s lifetime. As requirements for energy conservation get tougher, the minimum requirement for HVAC systems will be that they be high-performing and CO2 friendly, so you need to think about how effective your system is now.
Presenting the Grundfos iSOLUTIONS
Grundfos iSOLUTIONS looks beyond individual components and creates an intelligent system of pumps, drives, sensors and software that work together to optimise performance in any HVAC system and create the conditions for energy saving within efficient buildings. Grundfos iSOLUTIONS comprises a wide range of intelligent and energy saving solutions that make commissioning and installation easy and will also track the performance of the building. It can even monitor and control your systems. You can soon start turning your building into an eco building.
There are three main solutions:
1. Grundfos MIXIT is an integrated solution that replaces all separate components in one mixing loop. Grundfos prefabricated Modular systems are factory-built systems that are pre-wired, pre-tested and pre-commissioned ready for simple and fast on-site installation and operation
2. Grundfos Distributed Pumping is a paradigm shift in how to control chilled water systems. It allows you to fully eliminate control and balancing valves, replacing them with smaller, intelligent pumps that adapt to system demand based on the chilled water temperature for optimum building energy efficiency. The result is reduced CAPEX from a downsized primary pump as well as a better balanced system. This enables you to improve indoor comfort and gain a significant energy saving
3. Grundfos BuildingConnect gives you a simple and user-friendly overview of all your applications and enables you to monitor every installation right from your desktop or tablet. BuildingConnect is constantly improving, and with continuous software updates, you’re ensured a future-proof solution that will always keep you up to date and provide optimum energy conservation
High-performance buildings
Listen to Bent Jensen, CEO, Commercial Building Services Sales at Grundfos give his perspective on how we can address challenges such as urbanization and population growth by designing and optimizing our commercial buildings to run more efficiently.
You can listen to more podcasts from Grundfos Commercial Building Services - on your preferred platform.
Are you working with commercial buildings?
SOURCES
Source1: Global CO2 emissions from power generation is 12.5 GT (2010), World Energy Outlook 2012, International Energy Agency (IEA) https://www.iea.org/reports/world-energy-outlook-2020
Source2: Global cooling report; International Energy Agency, June 2020 https://www.iea.org/reports/cooling
Source3: Guide to Best Practice Maintenance and Operation of HVAC Systems for Energy Efficiency (January 2012), Council of Australian Governments (COAG), Pages 36-37 https://www.airah.org.au/Content_Files/UsefulDocuments/DCCEE_HVAC_HESS_GuideToBestPractice2012.PDF
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