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Three energy management questions facility managers have
April 23, 2014 - The EnTouch Controls team just completed exhibiting at a number of key tradeshows where we met with facility managers from around the world who are interested in energy management systems (EMS) and reducing their energy costs.
April 23, 2014 By EnTouch Controls
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Top 3 Questions
Facility managers from organizations with multiple facilities seem to be facing many of the same issues as measured by the questions they would ask us at these shows.
Here are three challenging questions that we’ve heard—and the EMS benefits that address those challenges:
1. How can I better respond to unwarranted maintenance requests?
Many managers told us that a lot of their time is wasted by responding to needless service calls. This is mostly about comfort and complaints about a room being too hot or too cold. When HVAC controls are left unsecured, then unauthorized adjustments get made and that’s when the complaints start. With an EMS, responding to these requests is much easier. Thermostat security features eliminate unplanned changes to the HVAC settings, which reduces the complaints significantly. For the rest of the inquiries, facility managers are able to use the Cloud-based control centre to review the temperature settings remotely and check on system health in seconds to determine if there really is a problem.
2. Is there a way to make global changes to temperature controls?
This really hit home during the National Facilities Management & Technology Conference/Exposition in early March where a foot of snow hit Baltimore, Md., on the first day of the show. Attendees came to the event fresh from a round of resetting HVAC controls in response to the weather. An EMS controller would have saved them a lot of time. From a single screen the facility manager can see the temperature settings in all of their facilities and adjust all facilities at one time from any computer tablet or smartphone.
3. Can I customize the EMS for each of the sites I manage?
This question seemed driven both by facility diversity and by budget. For example, one facility manager we spoke to was responsible for 730 firehouses and EMT stations. He immediately saw the benefit of global control for all of these locations, but said that the size and configuration of each location was different. We explained to him that the EMS in each facility can be different and still offer him global control. A small EMT station can have just temperature control, whereas a large firehouse might also have lighting control and management of branch loads. More budget-minded tradeshow attendees had an immediate need for one feature, but liked have an upgrade path to other energy management features as more budget became available. This too is possible all within the same control system.
Our tradeshow season is only half over. We look forward to meeting with more attendees and updating you on new key questions that come from those meetings.
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By EnTouch Controls
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