Investigate Commissioning Persistence

Goal Statement:
To deliver a report on the persistence of the benefits from commissioning that optimizes performance of existing buildings. This work is examining causes of building performance degradation to develop recommendations that will improve the persistence of commissioning benefits.

Results:
The commissioning persistence study was conducted for existing buildings and new construction. We studied 10 existing buildings on the Texas A&M University campus that had been commissioned by 1997 or earlier and 10 new buildings in California and Oregon that were commissioned before 1999.

Some conclusions from the existing buildings study:

• Initial energy savings from commissioning decreased by an average of 9 percent per year, but energy and monetary savings remained substantial despite the decrease.
• Mechanical failures accounted for 75 percent of the decrease; control changes accounted for the remainder.
• Further work is needed to understand reasons for the operating changes that were observed.
• Improved procedures are needed to support the persistence of initial savings from commissioning.

Some preliminary conclusions from the new construction study:

• A lack of documentation of commissioning and limited support for building operators undermines the persistence of commissioning benefits.
• Even with these shortcomings, a large number of the improvements made during the commissioning process persisted.
• Owners and operators consider commissioning essential for building systems to function well.

Table of equipment and controls fixed during commissioning. Light-gray boxes show measures that persisted; black boxes show measures that did not persist.

Downloads and Links:

• "Persistence of Benefits from New Building Commissioning", Friedman H., Potter A., and Haasl T., Portland Energy Conservation. Claridge, D., Cho, S., Energy Systems Laboratory, Texas A&M University. Published in Proceedings of 11th National Conference on Building Commissioning, May 20-22, 2003. (1.69 MB, 17 pp)
   
• "Report on Strategies for Improving Persistence of Commissioning Benefits", Friedman, H., A. Potter, T. Haasl, and D. Claridge, Final Report, July 2003. (1.6 MB, 47 pp)
   
• "Persistence of Savings Obtained from Continuous Commissioning", Published in National Conference on Building Commissioning 2001 (NCBC) proceedings. (990 KB, 15 pp)
   
• "Persistence of Benefits from New Building Commissioning", Published in the proceedings of the 2002 ACEEE Summer Study on Energy Efficiency in Buildings. (900 KB, 14 pp)
   
• "Is Commissioning Once Enough?", Published in the proceedings of the 25th World Energy Engineering Congress, October 9, 10, 11, 2002 / Atlanta, Georgia. (1.0 MB, 9 pp)
   

Follow On Studies

• "Evaluation of Persistence of Savings from SMUD Retrocommissioning Program - Final Report", Bourassa, N.J., M.A. Piette, N. Motegi. Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, May 2004. LBNL-54984.
   
  Report, (934 KB, 25 pp)
  Zipped Appendices, (1.1 MB)
  

Contact: Norman Bourassa, Lawrence Berkeley National Lab (LBNL), (510) 486-6724