Why is Advanced Metering Important?

Advanced energy and water meters gather data that enables a host of analytic capabilities for building owners and operators, from basic energy and water benchmarking and forecasting, to detailed fault detection, condition-based monitoring, and system optimization. 

Why Install Advanced Meters?

• Legislative drivers
• Advanced Meter Use Cases
  • Energy and water savings
  • Cost savings
  • Decarbonization
  • Benchmarking 
  • Identifying efficiency and retrofit opportunities
  • Monitor utility budgets and costs
  • Develop reports for review and compliance
     

What is Advanced Meter?

An advanced meter records energy or water consumption data hourly or more frequently and provides daily or more frequent transmittal of measurements over a communication network to a central data collection point. Advanced meters are usually able to record other physical quantities in addition to consumption. Related to an advanced meter, an advanced metering device is an electronic meter with built-in metering and communication capabilities, or a separate electronic device coupled to a standard meter that enables communication to the on-site automated metering infrastructure.

Benefits of Metering

Advanced metering can provide facility managers and operators with real-time information about energy and water use and costs. This information can be used to optimize building operations, inform project planning, and meet energy and water reporting requirements.

It is important to note that advanced meters are not an efficiency/conservation technology per se; instead, the resulting data provided by advanced meters and associated infrastructure are resources that can be used by building owners and operators to make energy and water management decisions.

Depending on the type of data collected, these data can enable the following practices and functions:

• Verification and comparison of utility bills
• Benchmarking building energy and water use
• Proper allocation of costs or billing of reimbursable tenants
• Demand response or load shedding when purchasing electricity under time-based rates
• Measurement and verification of energy project performance
• Identifying operational improvement and retrofit project opportunities
• Measurement and verification of energy and water project performance
• Advanced modeling for fault detection and diagnosis and building controls optimization

Most of the meter data use cases listed above can result in a reduction in energy and water costs. The degree of cost reduction will depend on the unit cost of the energy and/or water saved and on how effectively the site analyzes its meter data and acts upon its findings and recommendations. 

Examples of additional metering benefits can include:

• Supporting efforts to attain ENERGY STAR and/or green building certifications
• Promoting tenant satisfaction by providing tenants with information to best manage their operations
• Prolonging equipment life (and reducing capital investment requirements) and improving its reliability by verifying efficient operations
• Assessing the impact of utility rate changes, allowing sites/agencies to address budget shortfalls on a proactive basis
• Evaluating progress against the goal to achieve 50 percent carbon-free energy on a 24/7 basis, per Executive Order 14057 

As advanced metering and sensor technologies evolve over time, new capabilities will be introduced to the metering space. Expanding or upgrading a metering system may be considered appropriate, based on an evaluation of a building’s metering objectives and the replacement cost of a more complex system. Advanced metering options will change in response to new material, electronic, and sensor development, as well as new and additional requirements for cybersecurity and real-time data information. Facility managers should be careful not to overdesign a system, thus unnecessarily increasing its cost.

When to Meter

When developing a metering plan for their building portfolio, facility managers should identify which buildings and end uses need to be metered. Some buildings use such a small amount of energy or water that advanced metering may not identify opportunities for reducing usage. Every building is different, and some may be higher in priority for metering due to their consumption profiles; therefore, standardized methods for metering would not address every conceivable situation. Federal buildings are considered “appropriate” for energy or water metering unless identified for exclusion within the “Federal Building Metering Guidance.” The criteria were developed based on the likelihood of energy or water meters offering cost-effective energy and water efficiency opportunities and may be useful to other building portfolio managers. 

Some questions to consider before installing advanced meters include:

• Will the building continue to be part of the portfolio in five years?
• Are the utility bills included in the rent of leased properties?
• Does the building have an energy-consuming heating or cooling system or significant process loads?
• Based on the building size and function requirements set forth in the “Federal Building Metering Guidance”, is the building appropriate for metering?

The decision to meter a building is easier the more a building manager knows about its operations. When in doubt, every building should be added to the list of buildings to meter and then prioritized based on when the investment can be made and when it will be useful.

Metering Basic Terms

Standard meters cumulatively measure and record aggregated usage data that are periodically retrieved for use in customer billing or energy management. A meter that is not an advanced meter is considered a standard meter. 

Advanced meters measure and record energy and water consumption data hourly or more frequently and transmit measurements over a communication network to a central collection point. 

Advanced metering infrastructure is an integrated network of advanced meters, communications, and data management systems. 

Advanced meter reading is a predecessor to advanced metering infrastructure, which refers to individual advanced meters that transmit readings over short distances without the need for manual logging.