Energy Management System Audit and Implementation in Educational Buildings

Concerning the high energy consumption of educational buildings in available study; it is conducted to estimate the energy consumption at the Faculty of Humanities (Building No. 2), Science and Research Campus (SRC) of the Islamic Azad University (IAU), Tehran, Iran. Auditing and implementing the energy management system in the implied building, efforts are finally made to propose managerial solutions towards reducing energy consumption in this building. After gathering data of the building, including quantity of energy consumption in a one-year period of study in 2005 and the energy consumption equipment in the building followed by a detailed data analysis, the overall energy consumption tendency is investigated in the building. As a result, it is found that the lightening system and electric motors of central heating system consumed the highest level of electricity energy and the highest thermal energy consumption due to boilers. By more analysis of the entire data, solutions are suggested for reducing the energy consumption used in lightening, central heating and cooling systems and boilers. A review of all the practical solutions for improving the systems available in the building showed that regarding the energy management matrix, the energy management system in the building stood at zero point, because the building lacked any operating unit under the title of 'Energy Management' which could monitor energy consumption at the university. Therefore, it is concluded that the energy efficiency in the building may be optimized to a certain extent by presenting a system for energy data collection, analysis and systematic implementation as well as a system for collection of basic information about energy-consuming equipment by means of measurement instruments. By providing this system, procedures are presented for optimizing energy consumption and saving in the building, while a management system and a complete information system are created at the same time. By employing the procedures described in the present study, 173,000 kilowatt-hours (kWh) of power as well as 323642 cubic meters of natural gas can be saved per year.