According to facility managers and other industry experts, commercial HVAC systems account for approximately 40% of a building’s total energy use. Due to the monetary costs associated with such high volume, building managers and property owners should recognize the reasons efficiency suffers before the fact and avoid the most common mistakes listed below.

Why is my commercial building losing energy efficiency? 

Installation Error – Your building’s HVAC system works extremely hard all day, and if, due to user error, the transmission of data from the HVAC system to the building manager is off, efficiency suffers from day one. Your coils could be asked to perform at levels never intended, which, in turn, will accelerate their decline in performance.

Outdated commercial HVAC equipment – Like any living thing, your building as well as the equipment used to make it function begins to die as soon as it’s built. Over time, dirty filters, clogged lines, low refrigerant, corrosion, worn belts, incorrect pressure and temperature negatively impact equipment HVAC performance and efficiency.  Many times, this can entail replacing many of the system’s core components, such as hot and cool water coils. If considering this option, make a checklist of the following and see how many come up short:

• Type, condition and age of HVAC equipment
• Manufacturer’s recommended performance of HVAC equipment 
• Overall performance of HVAC equipment based on location and original intent.

Temporary/Band-Aid Fixes – In response to complaints from a certain tenant or an entire floor, a facility manager might try to jury-rig the system into temporarily correcting those issues. More times than not, creating a work-around will only exacerbate previously existing problems. If you opt to not go the coil replacement route, spend the extra time and/or money to make sure you get the problem corrected the first time. This is guaranteed to save time and money in the future.

Maintenance staff cutbacks – Unfortunately, when looking to cut costs, building owners will first look to trim the maintenance staff. Like any industry, you have fewer people handling more responsibilities. As a result, things get missed, short cuts get taken, band aid fixes are applied, etc. In short, cutting back on staff can have negative consequences on your building’s performance.

Any of the above listed reasons can irreparably destroy the commercial coils that are the primary cogs in your HVAC system. Hopefully that does not happen in the near-term, but when the inevitable does occur and those coils need to be replaced, Capital Coil & Air is perfectly positioned to be your commercial coil replacement experts. We’d love the opportunity to earn your business on your next project, so please give us a try! You’ll be pleasantly surprised.