One of the biggest barriers to improving the energy efficiency of commercial buildings is a lack of performance data. Both owners and occupiers are often unaware of how well or badly their building is performing and it is often said that “if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it”. An appropriate energy metering strategy helps tackle this issue by enabling both parties to measure how much energy their building/floor area is consuming on a frequent basis, thereby providing them with the information needed to make targeted improvements.

The property industry is becoming increasingly interested in the use of metering systems given their many benefits, which include the potential for energy, cost and CO₂ savings, provision of data to support corporate reporting and compliance with increasing environmental legislation such as the CRC Energy Efficiency Scheme. The likely future mandatory role out of Display Energy Certificates to commercial buildings is an added driver.

The opportunities for confusion, however, are significant. An increasing number of suppliers in the market offering a perplexing variety of metering systems, coupled with a confusing range terms such as ‘smart’, ‘AMR’, ‘advanced’ ‘sub’ ‘fiscal’ and ‘check’ meters, creates potential for a disjointed industry approach to such a key area of environmental management.

The BBP has therefore produced its ‘Better Metering Toolkit’ which sets out the metering options currently available for commercial buildings, considers the costs and benefits and provides advice on how metering data can be used to make energy, cost and CO₂ reductions.

It is hoped that this Toolkit will provide a valuable guide for ‘non-technical’ decision makers and will support both owners and occupiers when engaging with metering system designers, suppliers and utility companies in order to ensure that the most appropriate and effective solutions are implemented in their buildings.