Demand Limiting: steps you can take
In this blog, we’re going to investigate demand limiting. It’s a timely and important subject, because rising energy prices are increasing the difficulty of achieving commercial success. How does demand limiting help? Read on…
What is demand limiting? It’s an approach to building management that involves deploying a range of different strategies and technologies to help control and reduce a facilities maximum power demand during peak usage times. Energy demands vary according to both the season and operational activities and from region to region. However, these variations can be predictable and energy utilities try to balance their output according to demand.
One measure utility companies use is variable pricing – with suppliers often charging higher rates during peak periods. If you can reduce demand at the right time, you can achieve significant cost savings.
What are the strategies and technologies you can leverage to optimize energy consumption to maintain a better balance between supply and demand? Let’s find out. First, we’ll look at the technologies involved in demand limiting.
Demand Limiting Technologies
There are plenty of examples of demand limiting technologies. Smart meters are rapidly being deployed across commercial properties. They’re particularly useful to capture and then provide real-time data on your energy consumption patterns. With this information you can more efficiently manage and forecast your energy usage.
The second demand limiting technology is another you’ll already be familiar with; your Energy and Building Management System (EMS/BMS). This is a tool you can use to monitor and control your energy usage across sub-systems in your building to optimize performance.
Demand Limiting Strategies
Load shedding
The most familiar means of temporarily reducing energy consumption is simply turning off non-essential items that consume energy during peak demand periods, a practice known as “load shedding”. To understand load shedding, imagine a commercial office building on a hot summer day with air conditioning demand spiking.
In such a use case, your EMS/BMS will detect that the building’s energy demand is approaching its peak threshold. To mitigate the impact of this, the system can be programmed to automatically reduce the cooling requirement of less critical areas within the building (such as conference rooms that are not being used or common areas) while maintaining comfort in more critical spaces like offices and server rooms. It’s a simple action that lowers overall energy consumption during peak hours and avoids higher energy costs.
Demand Response programs
Many utility providers offer incentives in return for reducing energy use during peak periods. Again, let’s imagine a use case scenario that enables us to understand how such programs work. Our scenario remains a hot summer day where the utility provider has issued a demand response event as electricity demand is spiking.
The first thing that happens in this scenario is that the utility provider sends an event notification to your EMS/BMS before the anticipated demand response event.
Your EMS/BMS will analyze the building’s energy usage patterns and identify areas where energy consumption could be reduced without impacting operations in a significant way. You’re notified of these findings, and automated strategies are activated to address them.
What might the load reduction strategies be? HVAC adjustments are an obvious example. If you have two hours’ notice of the event that’s coming, you might pre-cool the building before the event starts. Or you might adjust thermostat setpoints by 1-2° in non-critical areas during the event itself.
Another example? Lighting controls might be adjusted, turning off or dimming non-essential lighting (perhaps in common areas, parking lots, or hallways). You might also delay non-essential equipment operations such as water pumps or elevators that access unused floors.
In all these scenarios, your EMS/BMS can continuously monitor energy consumption and adjust your systems in real-time to meet load reduction targets without exceeding comfort thresholds.
The outcomes of such actions can be considerable. It’s not uncommon for a building to reduce its energy consumption by as much as 20% in a demand response event, in return for doing which it banks incentives from its energy provider for participation.
To help you benefit from all of this, NexRev Freedom integrates smoothly and easily into the notification mechanisms offered by your utility provider enabling automated control for Demand Response programs.
Demand Limiting is an important weapon in the building manager’s arsenal of tactics to both reduce costs and improve performance. To learn more or find out how NexRev can help you take steps in this important area of building management please click the link below.
About NexRev
NexRev is the leading provider of cloud-based, multi-site energy management systems, backed by AI and delivered by SaaS models, that help businesses eliminate energy waste and reduce costs.
Our innovative Freedom™ EMS/BMS solution brings process-driven intelligence and AI to facilities management, providing complete remote control and centralized visibility of your energy-consuming devices across complex, nationwide property portfolios for leading brands in retail, theatres, restaurants, commercial, and industrial facilities.
With NexRev Freedom, our customers reduce waste, optimize energy management, and generate permanent cost savings by making the right decisions. To begin a discussion on how we can help you to reduce energy costs and waste please email us at