Methodology Development for a Comprehensive and Cost-Effective Energy Management in Public Administrations

Abstract

The rising energy costs, the growing concern about global competition and environmental issues and the approaching exhaustion of world energy resources are urging national governments and industrial companies to improve energy management. Nevertheless, energy saving can be obtained only if this topic is approached in a systematic and comprehensive way. To this aim, an integrated methodology for energy efficiency based on a systematic approach for energy consumption/cost reduction in public administrations is presented. The aim of this study is to define a useful tool for supporting Energy Audits in the public sector; in particular, the present analysis is addressed to the public infrastructures (buildings and services) managed by small-medium municipalities, which usually feature great inefficiencies in the energy management and energy costs forming a consistent part of their budget. In this study a system of composite indicators for mapping the energy performance in different and successive levels of detail is proposed. The achievable result is a set of energy benchmark based evaluations which allows the implementation of the more opportune energy saving measures. As for its intrinsic generality, this methodology can be applied to different types of municipalities and allows obtaining immediate and clear results.