utiliVisor Launches Portable Energy Monitoring Service
NEW YORK — utiliVisor launched Intelligent Performance Testing (IPT), a portable energy monitoring service designed to increase energy plant performance by optimizing chiller plant equipment.
utiliVisor energy technicians install non-obtrusive, portable BTU meters, electric meters and a web server to gather five-minute incremental interval data on chiller plant equipment. The data is collected in real time and analyzed by utiliVisor energy engineers to evaluate equipment performance and identify energy saving opportunities.
The IPT process allows owners to establish the true operating cost of chilled water generation by identifying excessive kW usage at part load conditions, improper water flows that might cause heat transfer problems, inefficient compressor control, and chiller inefficiencies verses the manufacturer’s design specifications.
The service provides the basis for implementing optimal chiller sequencing and creates baseline operating efficiency for future chiller plant upgrades.
“Essentially what we do is come in with a suitcase of equipment, some meters, we hook up the system, collect some data and push it out to the web,” said Peter Angerame, director of sales for utiliVisor. “Our engineers analyze the data over a prescribed period of time and then make recommendations on how to improve the plant.”
The portable system is a logical expansion for the company, which has an established background in monitoring large utility plants, online and in real time, and monitors some of the largest chill water plants in the country. IPT developed out of requests by building owners for a scaled-down version for their smaller chilled plant applications.
IPT users see energy cost savings from 12 to 20 percent. Cost for the service varies based on how long the customer chooses to keep the system on — the company recommends one week to one month — but likely ranges from $2,000 to $10,000, including analysis.
Interest is strong from commercial real estate firms, hospitals and pharmaceutical plants, Angerame said.
“We have seen some definite demand for it because most of the time, in these plants — especially on the chilled-water side — we find that there isn’t accurate measurement. And that’s kind of goes across the board,” he said. “Measurement and adjusting flows and understanding actually what the equipment is doing is a starting point to fixing the problem at hand, which is the efficiency that is dragging down the efficiency of the plant itself.”
The New York-based company has partners nationwide that provide its services, with specific interest coming from Chicago, Los Angeles, Seattle, Arizona, Florida and Texas as well as New York.
Currently, the company is not concerned with competition.
“This is kind of specific and what is nice is it’s a niche that we’ve been in for a very long time. We understand how the chilled water system works very specifically for all these different types of machinery,” Angerame said. “The real value-add of what we’re doing is the fact that we have trained eyes looking at the information and dissecting what the numbers actually mean, instead of just a canned program that spits out a report that, in our opinion, is pretty useless to an owner. We’re giving specific points to tell them how to improve their system.”