by Rebecca Walker — September 3, 2008—FMLink, the US Green Building Council (USGBC), the Association for Facilities Engineering (AFE), and the Building Owners and Managers Association (BOMA) International have launched what purports to be the largest-ever survey to study what energy-savings measures companies have undertaken. The goal is to leverage the results of the survey to help companies identify their “best bets” for energy efficiencywhich strategies worked well, which didn’t, and why.
The survey is open to those who own or manage their facilities, focusing on commercial, industrial, government, academic, medical and other types of non-residential facilities. To ensure meaningful data, it will apply only to those facilities that have been occupied prior to January 1, 2007. The survey was launched online on August 28, 2008, and may be taken by going to:
http://survey.constantcontact.com/survey/a07e2cp8tkifkg32rm8/start.
Each participating organization will invite its members to participate in the survey, in an effort to attract the largest number of responses for this important topic. As incentives to increase the number of respondents, FMLink will send all respondents a copy of the interpreted results and BOMA’s white paper, “30 Ways to Save Energy.” Respondents also will receive the USGBC report, “Energy Performance of LEED for New Construction Buildings.”
The first part of the in-depth survey focuses on the energy consumption of the participants’ buildings; this information will be used to identify the most effective energy-savings strategies. The remainder of the survey goes into detail on the buildings’ HVAC, lighting, roofing and window systems. The survey allows respondents to share their knowledge, while omitting the portions where they do not have expertise. The results will be announced at Greenbuild in Boston on November 19, 2008.
“With the ever-growing need to reduce our collective carbon footprint and deal with the skyrocketing costs of energy, it is critical that we better understand not only what our building owners and facilities managers are doing about this, but also to see which actions have made the greatest impact,” said Peter Kimmel, an architect and IFMA Fellow, as well as the Publisher of FMLink. “By being able to survey the members and subscribers of such qualified organizations, we are hoping that these results will be more meaningful and useful than any prior to now.”
For more information, see the Web sites of the participants: FMLink, USGBC, the Association for Facilities Engineering, or BOMA.
The survey is being co-sponsored by McQuay International, Performance Roof Systems, and Philips Lighting—three companies that have made a commitment to reducing our carbon footprint.
