Evaluation of water and energy metering and monitoring practices in European local authorities

Panel: Panel 3. Monitoring & evaluation: understanding change and how to deliver energy efficiency

Authors:
Vasco Ferreira, Research Group on Energy and Sustainable Development - IDMEC, Instituto Superior Técnico – Technical University of Lisbon, Portugal
Paul Fleming, Institute of Energy and Sustainable Development, De Montfort University, United Kingdom

Abstract

Metering and monitoring building water and energy consumption is becoming an increasingly important activity in European municipalities as a tool to improve building energy efficiency. This paper presents the results of a survey to European local authorities carried out to investigate metering, monitoring and energy management practices in European municipal buildings. The respondents were informed about the survey through different European networks of cities and municipalities active in sustainability, climate change and energy issues, such as Energie-Cites, ICLEI-Europe and CEMR. The survey had a total of 76 respondents from 19 European countries, responsible for managing energy and/or water consumption in over 63,000 municipal buildings. It was found that nearly all the European local authorities represented in the study are collecting data on building water, electricity and gas consumption. This data is collected both manually and automatically and is being used to identify and quantify energy savings. However, energy managers are using relatively simple analytical and visualisation techniques to analyse the data. The survey showed that there is a demand for more automated, accurate and flexible metering, and for easy-to-use water and energy consumption monitoring tools and techniques.