Your tenant in the eastern wing is chronically cold. You’re fighting an uphill battle for safety as your tenant’s employees bring personal heaters into the space.  In the western wing, however, your tenant’s employees can’t get cool enough. They complain of high energy bills while swearing the humidity will lead to mold problems. Uncomfortable tenants are more than a headache. They are a threat to your bottom line. Thermal comfort can impact your tenants’ desire to renew their leases. Additionally, a commercial property with low thermal comfort may indicate inefficiencies in its climate controls or building envelope. High turnover and an inefficient building will adversely affect your bottom line. Thermal Comfort + Your Bottom Line The American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers defines thermal comfort as the condition of mind that expresses satisfaction with the thermal environment. It is subjectively assessed by using the Comfort Scale or Thermal Index, both of which evaluate temperature, humidity, air velocity, and radiant temperature. As comfort is subjective, a commercial building’s thermal comfort ranking will vary from person to person. Health and Safety Executive recognizes an international standard which suggests that a building has “reasonable comfort” when at least 80 percent of its occupants are thermally comfortable. Improving Thermal Comfort in Commercial Properties There are three ways to notably improve tenant comfort and protect your investment: 1. Identify and Fix Leaks Address leaks in the building envelope. Contact a contractor to identify areas where your heating and cooling efforts are defeated by oversights in construction or maintenance. Resealing windows and adding weather stripping to doors, for example, are two quick fixes for drafts. Leakage significantly decreases the energetic efficiency of an HVAC system. As a result, the HVAC system may be working overtime to regulate indoor conditions. Have your units...

If encouragement to “save money; cut carbon; breathe easier” seems more prominent than usual where you live and work, it’s because today is Energy Efficiency Day, and that’s the key message the event’s organizers are promoting. A nationwide alliance of energy efficiency advocacy groups sponsors Energy Efficiency Day to share “tips, tools and stories that promote the multiple benefits of energy efficiency, from lower costs to healthier homes,” as stated in the event’s website. About 450 local governments, universities, organizations, corporations and utilities are hosting an array of activities including expos, energy-saving device installations, free energy assessments and symposia with thought leaders. Organizers of Energy Efficiency Day, an annual occurrence since 2016, encourage people to stage their own events, such as a “treasure hunt” check of home appliance, lighting and insulation efficiency, and to share their experiences from the day (#EEDay2019). Technologies that lower energy bills and make properties more comfortable are part of Energy Efficiency Day’s focus—and have long been a staple of Yardi’s business. The Yardi Pulse Suite, an integrated set of software solutions, supports sustainability efforts by maximizing efficiency across all property types. “October 2 is Energy Efficiency Day. But efficiency is year-round,” says the event’s website, which pretty well summarizes Yardi’s approach as well. Every month last year, for example, the company benchmarked more than 1,700 buildings across 47 client portfolios in 27 compliance jurisdictions in ENERGY STAR® Portfolio Manager®. A grant to the BOMA Water and Waste Challenge helped property owners and managers improve their water and waste management practices. Ongoing leadership, innovation and commitment to environmental protection earned Yardi designation as an ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year. The company joined GRESB’s Global Partner program this year as a sustainability consultant and solution provider. Yardi promotes energy management...

Solar power is a burgeoning alternative energy source that accounts for 1.6% of total U.S. electricity generation and encompasses enough installed capacity to power 12.3 million homes. It’s the second-fastest source of new generation on the U.S. power grid, but it’s not flawless. Arrays that capture solar energy don’t work at night or when obscured by cloud cover, atmosphere or seasonality. The United Nations estimates the global population will be 9.6 billion by 2050, so the rush is on to find new ways to generate large quantities of clean energy. For decades, scientists have explored putting solar arrays where night never falls and clouds don’t form and power transmission need not be interrupted by fickle weather or unfavorable orbital tilt. Specifically, in geostationary or low-Earth orbit, where satellites could capture solar energy, convert it into a microwave or a laser and beam it to Earth. Ground-based receivers would then convert the energy into useable electricity and add it to the electric grid. “If solar power is going to be the principal so-called ‘dispatchable’ baseload source of power that replaces today’s fossil-fuel-powered electric-generating stations, inherently you have to have the generating source be available all the time,” environmental scientist Dr. Deanna Conners wrote in 2018. Efforts to put space-based solar power generation into production have been hindered by cost and technology impediments. But recent developments are bringing the concept closer to reality. In 2018, scientists at the California Institute of Technology announced that they created a prototype lightweight tile, the building block of solar arrays capable of harnessing and transmitting solar energy from space. Earlier this year, China announced plans to place the first solar power station in geostationary orbit by 2050. Other countries in Asia and Europe are working on their own projects. A...

Want to cut costs across your portfolio while improving environmental conditions for future generations? Of course you do. You can achieve both when you turn sustainability initiatives into games that get residents and tenants involved. The basic tools below can help you get started today. Gamification: Undercover Education (and Self-Help) Meetings, lectures, and classes on saving energy rarely alter our habits. Feedback, seeing the results of our actions often in real-time, has proven to help to change habits. That’s where gamification fits into your energy-saving strategy. What is gamification? In short, it’s implementing game design elements in non-game contexts. It’s making something that tends to be unexciting and intangible more exciting and interactive. Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development in the Netherlands published research on the gamification of energy savings. Researchers concluded that solely issuing smart meters in buildings did not result in optimal energy savings. It was also necessary to change residents’ energy usage behavior. Games proved to be an effective way to heighten awareness and alter user habits. Historically, residents and tenants are slow to change comfortable behaviors even if we know that we can save money. That’s because changing our behaviors takes effort, such as closing blinds before we leave the building to minimize radiant heat or using an app to turn off lights and outlets. None of those tasks takes much effort. But any task is yet another thing to do in a world where we already feel too busy! Gamification helps to take the effort out of changing our comfortable behaviors and makes conserving resources more entertaining. Copernicus Institute details the following components for effective gamification of energy savings. What Makes Gamification Successful? Gamification can be simplified for both commercial and multifamily properties. The American Council for an Energy Efficient...

The processes and technology needed to start moving to “net zero” buildings—those that produce enough renewable energy to meet their annual energy consumption requirements—are available today. How to make them widely understood, accepted and implemented was the focus of a recent webinar featuring Akshai Rao, Yardi vice president of procure to pay and energy, and other industry experts. ENERGY STAR® estimates that the average commercial building wastes 30% of its energy consumption. Real estate is the fourth largest generator of greenhouse gas emissions; if that industry alone cut its emissions by 30%, the U.S. could hit the Paris Agreement targets, Rao told the webinar audience. This means there are significant monetary as well as societal incentives for achieving net zero. “Because energy is a building’s second largest controllable cost, it can really eat into investor returns. Having a cohesive energy strategy is one of few things the real estate industry can do from an operations perspective that increases portfolio value,” Rao said. Any hope of achieving a net zero building or portfolio, he said, starts with understanding a building’s load factors and prioritizing which buildings to invest in, which is based on benchmarking the portfolio against the industry with ENERGY STAR. ”There’s so much cost and consumption data to be gained just from utility bills. Rather than just approving and paying them, you can achieve portfolio-wide insights and property cost/consumption trends that help identify capital investment that can reduce consumption,” Rao said. Properties can couple this data with real-time metering to visualize the demand profile of a building, which can highlight tactical actions for reducing spend. Once you have data on your portfolio, the next step is to identify properties to invest in for the highest energy savings return. Several solutions on the market...

Dallas-based multifamily community manager Pinnacle sought to reduce utility late fees and increase vacant utility cost recoveries at 170,000 residential units that it manages. “We needed to automate the entire process—payables, receivables, consumption data analysis and reporting that drilled down to a granular level of detail,” said Nicole Ellery, the company’s ancillary performance manager. Doing all this required replacing its cumbersome manual utility consumption tracking and billing with the Yardi Energy Suite. One element of the suite, Yardi Utility Expense Management, receives, validates and completes payments for Pinnacle’s utility bills. Another part, Yardi Utility Billing, monitors and bills residents for their utility consumption, which helps the company recover vacant unit costs, monitor usage, forecast utility revenue and cut waste with consumption alerts. How has the Yardi Energy Suite worked out for Pinnacle? The bottom line, Ellery said on a utility expense management panel at the most recent Yardi Advanced Solutions Conference (YASC), is “lower late fees across the board.” That happened because the comprehensive solution for utility billing, energy management and submeter data administration helps the company “track how properties are performing with line-by-line data down to the individual meter level as opposed to only invoice data.” “When we onboard a new property, we can see red flags such as high consumption on a meter and follow up with an investigation,” Ellery said. “Our property managers and accountants can drill down to each general ledger account and invoice if anything looks off and see what’s going on. We can see gradual increases in consumption and process invoices as soon as they come in.” She added, “We have saved thousands of dollars every year by nearly eliminating late fees. The suite vastly simplified our vacant unit recovery process, so it maximizes income too. We’d be...

The sustainability framework that leading retail property owner, operator and developer Macerich operates under calls for eliminating energy waste and nearly eliminating emissions, water waste and landfill impact. Evidence of Macerich’s success in translating these “Innovating to Zero” principles into best practices includes a No. 1 GRESB Benchmark ranking for four years running among North American retailers and a Top 30 onsite generation designation in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Green Power Partnership. The Santa Monica, Calif.-based S&P 500 company has generated 16 megawatts of grid relief and saved more than 300,000 KwH annually with solar panel installations and LED retrofits. It’s the only U.S. retail real estate company to earn the highest “Climate A List” ranking from CDP (formerly the Carbon Disclosure Project), the world’s most comprehensive collection of self-reported environmental data. Another accolade came in the form of a Commercial Real Estate Digital Innovation (“Digie”) Award in the Most Intelligent Building Project category that Macerich received at the Realcomm ׀ IBCon conferences in June. Macerich recently marked another notable milestone: the 10-year anniversary of a multifaceted energy management sustainability program that has reduced the company’s environmental impacts while squeezing every ounce of efficiency from its operations. The company’s plan called for using advanced energy management software to combine internet of things data with additional logic and analytics functionality. The goal was to turn disparate charts, graphs and reports into coherent, actionable intelligence for operations teams and managers across 51 million square feet of real estate in 15 U.S. states. The software central to achieving that vision, the Yardi Pulse Suite, integrated Macerich’s central energy management systems with utility billing, energy data collection and the Yardi Voyager property management and accounting system. The suite enables connection, analysis and display of building information from Macerich’s...

Yardi didn’t have to venture far recently to share sustainability expertise with an audience eager for innovative energy efficiency ideas. The company provided top-level sponsorship plus an exhibit and speaker for the California Higher Education Sustainability Conference (CHESC), a forum for research and case studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, just a few miles from its headquarters. The four-day gathering included more than 700 California higher education professionals including sustainability coordinators, construction, energy and environmental managers, engineers and facilities directors along with faculty and students. Experts from Yardi shared how the Yardi Pulse Suite, an integrated set of software solutions, supports sustainability efforts by helping reduce energy costs and consumption across all property types. They provided examples of the company’s success in helping property owners benchmark to ENERGY STAR® and make energy efficiency investments, and shared how Yardi promotes energy efficiency and sustainability through webinars, articles in trade publications, educational sessions at industry conferences and other activities. CHESC attendees learned that Yardi further displayed its sustainability sensibilities by achieving ENERGY STAR certification for its headquarters in 2018 and installing a real-time online dashboard that shows consumption data for each building at the corporate campus. In April 2019, the company’s initiatives earned designation as an ENERGY STAR Partner of the Year. “It is our hope that tools like ours will continue to help property owners and managers be more successful with energy initiatives and comply with new mandates like the California 2030 Green Building Goals,” Lexi Beausoleil, marketing campaigns specialist for Yardi energy solutions, told the conference, adding that technology can be a powerful tool for engaging people to “see the impact of their behaviors and empower them to make better choices.” Other presenters at the conference’s opening session included Dominique Hargreaves, deputy...

The Climate Mobilization Act is a package of legislation designed to drastically reduce carbon emissions from New York City’s commercial properties. It covers everything from closing high emitting power plants and installing renewable energy sources to limiting emissions from buildings of over 25,000 square feet. A major component of the proposal, Local Law 97 (formerly Bill 1253), was approved by the city council in April 2019 and focuses on greenhouse gas emissions limits for existing buildings. We asked Brian Fridkin, a Yardi Client Services Division team leader in Yardi Energy, for an analysis of LL 97. Q: How will this bill impact Yardi clients in New York City? Fridkin: Many clients who own or manage any commercial property of over 25,000 square feet will have to comply with the law’s carbon emission limits starting in 2024. That’s five years away, but they need to act now to meet the deadline. To comply, property owners will have to calculate their building’s carbon limit, which is based on the square footage of their building. They will then have to calculate their current emissions based on the emission coefficients set in the law. To avoid penalties, they will have to make reductions in the next five years that equal the difference between their emissions and limit.  What’s more, the emission limits change every five years. The limits for 2030-2034, for example, are about half of those for 2024-2029. That’s good because property owners can ease into the changes, but they must constantly prepare for upcoming limits. Additionally, there are minimum requirements that a building must meet by 2024, which include adjusting temperature set points for heat and hot water, repairing system leaks, insulating pipes, ensuring steam traps are operating correctly, complying with lighting standards and weatherizing windows....

This is the last year that businesses are eligible for the 30 percent federal investment tax credit (ITC) for solar—sort of. A few simple steps can position businesses take advantage of the solar ITC before step downs begin next year. The Tax Benefit Step Down Tax benefits have motivated sustainable upgrades over the past ten years. The 30 percent ITC was the most popular. The ITC “provides owners of solar systems with the ability to offset tax payments owed to the IRS in an amount equal to 30 percent of the eligible cost basis of a solar photovoltaic system,” summarizes Smart Energy Decisions. Beginning in 2020, however, the tax benefit will gradually decrease. The first step decline is to 26 percent for projects that “begin construction” in 2020. In 2021, the benefit declines to 22 percent. All projects starting in or after 2022 receive only 10 percent. “The good news is that there is currently a 30 percent ITC for the cost of the system for those installing solar before December 31st, 2019,” emphasized Ray Segars, CEM, consultant for energy and sustainability on Yardi’s energy team. He added, “The emphasis is on credit. This is a credit not a tax deduction. Tax deductions reduce taxable income, thus reducing associated taxes. Tax credits are more valuable because they reduce the actual tax bill dollar for dollar.” Gaining the Advantage on the Solar ITC Notice 2018-59 details strategies to help corporations navigate the step downs with financial finesse. Firstly, “beginning construction” is a surprisingly loose term.  There are two ways that a project may begin and still qualify for the year’s tax benefit. The Physical Work Test entails beginning physical work on your solar project The Five Percent Test entails paying or incurring 5 percent or...

Want to make your property more appealing to prospects? Keep their bills low. Senior living clients love to save money. Even more so, they love knowing that their housing provider is taking additional lengths to make saving money easier. By focusing on utility expenses, you’re creating value and enticing customers with cost savings. Cost savings on utilities aren’t traditionally sexy in advertising. It’s hard to make submeter installation look exciting. But money saved has proved to be appealing to seniors, especially when the savings are complemented with improved efficiency and high-quality services. Sustainability Matters Baby Boomers value sustainability. A 2018 High Tide Technologies survey of 2,000 adults discovered that Baby Boomers are more frugal than younger generations. Boomers consume less water and electricity. They’re also more likely to recycle, compost, and be food waste conscious. A separate study lead by Pew Research suggests that 36 percent of Boomers have molded lifestyles that protect the environment “at all times.” Only 12 percent of Gen Xers and Millennials report similar sentiments. The two bodies of research indicate that seniors are looking for more than fancy meal plans. They are seeking housing providers that are concerned about the welfare of their finances and the environment. So how do businesses deliver savings to residents? We sat down with Akshai Rao, vice president of energy and procurement at Yardi, to learn more. The Need for New Strategies While lowering overhead costs benefits businesses, that savings can be passed on to residents. Satisfied residents improve the bottom line, offering a win on two fronts for business owners. “Focusing on reducing consumption doesn’t just affect the bottom line, it may make you more desirable to potential residents,” says Rao. But a recent Argentum survey reveals that 49 percent of executives viewed...

Yardi has long supported the mission of Global Real Estate Sustainability Benchmark (GRESB), an Amsterdam-based limited private company, to improve real estate sustainability performance with environmental, social and governance benchmarking. The property management technology provider recently elevated its commitment by becoming one of just nine sustainability consultants and solution providers in GRESB’s Global Partner program. In this role, Yardi helps GRESB participants complete sustainability assessments, manage ESG data and advance ESG performance. The company will also collaborate with the organization’s industry, media and research partners to share sustainability best practices across the property management industry. GRESB works with the industry to define the global standard for sustainability performance in real assets, providing standardized and validated ESG data to the capital markets. More than 80 institutional investors, collectively representing more than $18 trillion in institutional capital, use GRESB data and analytical tools. In 2018 GRESB assessed 903 real estate funds and property companies, 75 infrastructure funds, 280 infrastructure assets and 25 debt portfolios. “GRESB members can use Yardi’s energy solutions to drive actionable environmental, financial and operational insights into their real estate portfolios and engage more closely with the investor community. These capabilities benefit our clients around the world, and we are pleased to extend them to an even broader community of real estate portfolio managers,” said Akshai Rao, vice president of energy and procurement for Yardi. A GRESB evaluation measures sustainability performance indicators including energy consumption, greenhouse gas emissions, water consumption and waste. A multi-layer validation process produces high-quality data that investors and participants can use in their investment and decision-making processes. “Real estate companies that establish and track a full range of ESG metrics achieve multiple tangible business outcomes for shareholders,” GRESB says on its website. In one recent project, S&P Dow Jones...

Did you know that adding sustainable features to your property can improve tenant retention? It’s true! If you’ve been brainstorming ways to increase lease renewals and decrease overhead costs, green upgrades may be the answer.  The Benefits of Sustainability Tenants look favorably upon earth conscious workspaces. DTZ, an international leader in commercial real estate services, analyzed responses to the 2015 Kingsley Associates’ tenant survey. Researchers discovered a strong correlation between sustainability and client satisfaction. Respondents expressed greater satisfaction with sites that offered environmentally conscious upgrades and services. Fortunately, there are several sustainable features that you can offer that also benefit you! Check out the suggestions below: Promote paperless services. Online services such as online rent payment, online maintenance requests, and online communication are easy ways to decrease deforestation and keep paper out of landfills. Clients will love that online services are quick, simple, and easy to track. You’re improving efficiency for staff while cutting costs on supplies, printing, and fewer late payments. Implement intelligent utility billing. Catching leaks, billing errors, and monitoring consumption through submetering are just a few benefits of energy management systems. Systems’ automated cost recovery programs can save thousands. Make ride share easier. The share economy is estimated to become a $335 billion industry by 2025. Show that you’re savvy to what clients want by promoting ride share at your property. Designate a few easily accessible spaces for ride share drivers. Shared rides decrease traffic congestion. Conduct an energy and resource audit. No one likes to be audited. Fortunately, this audit is a great way to shave overhead costs and gain points with occupants. Have a third-party conduct a water and energy audit of your property. Professionals can catch leaks and wasted resources to help you save money, and then pass...

Solar energy technology is becoming more powerful and versatile than ever. That’s a good sign for property owners seeking cost and sustainability benefits. According to the Solar Energy Industries Association, enough solar photovoltaic capacity—created when semiconducting materials convert sunlight into electricity—was installed in the U.S. in 2018 to power 12.3 million homes, and total installed capacity is expected to more than double over the next five years. A recent milestone in solar energy development was San Jose, Calif.-based SunPower’s development of the world’s most powerful solar cells for the residential market. They’re capable of delivering 60% more energy than conventional solar panels over 25 years using the same amount of roof space. That might be of particular interest to residents of the manufacturer’s home state, which in 2018 became the first to require that all new homes have solar power. In another significant breakthrough on the residential front, engineers at Belgian university KU Leuven have created a solar panel prototype capable of converting sunlight directly into hydrogen using moisture in the air. This would give households their own greenhouse gas-free source of fuel for cooking, heating and other activities. They wouldn’t have to rely on industrial-scale production of hydrogen gas, which generates greenhouse emissions. The technology remains under development and it’s unclear when it will be brought to market. Other developers are working on harnessing solar energy to melt snow on roads during the day and light them at night, power home window curtains and warm car seats. Additional projects encompass everything from battery storage enhancements to aesthetic matters like customizing cells to blend into a roof’s design. Energy Sage, a service that connects homeowners with solar equipment installers, says, “For those considering solar panels systems, this long list of solar panel technology innovations from...