ENRG 53: Utility Rates, Benchmarking & Financial Analysis

Program Description:

The Commercial Building Energy Analysis and Audits program at City College of San Francisco prepares students to conduct energy audits, evaluate building systems for efficiency, analyze energy data, and apply financial and business strategies in audit reporting. The program is divided into 15 modular courses designed for a community college level student. These courses are adaptable and can be selected, reorganized, or offered in a shorter format to suit individuals with experience in construction, architecture, HVAC, building operations, or mechanical engineering.

Course Description:

This course, from the BEST Center and City College of San Francisco, focuses on utility rates, benchmarking, and financial analysis. Students study utility rate types and charges, benchmarking tools such as EnergyStar Portfolio Manager and LBNL’s Energy IQ, methods for estimating costs, and calculating the financial benefits of recommended energy efficiency projects. In completing the course, students will be able to:

• Compare tariff and rate schedules used by utilities to determine customer energy bills,
• Use multiple tools to analyze billing data for commercial buildings,
• Assess the impact of building type, climate and occupancy patterns and tenant use on commercial building energy use,
• Use benchmarking tools to compare the Energy Use Intensity of buildings of similar type and climate, and illustrate typical energy use patterns of specific facility types, and
• determine the cost of various energy efficiency measures, and calculate the value of them using various metrics.

Course Contents:

Course resources include a course outline, three PowerPoint presentations, two benchmarking reference documents, and a resource list. 

The 5-page course outline includes a course description, learning outcomes, and a detailed course topics outline. Topics include: utility rate structures, building energy consumption benchmarking, energy and economics, and cost estimation. Sections detailing the types of in-class and out-of-class assignments required and other textbooks and resources are also included.

The Understanding Utility Rates PowerPoint presentation covers rates and tariffs for energy utilities, Time-Varying Pricing, PG&E electric and natural gas schedules, and other utilities in California.

The benchmarking presentation covers the goal of benchmarking, the Energy Star Portfolio Manager, other benchmarking tools, and benchmarking projects.

The presentation on financial analysis offers an introduction to economics and cost, basic project evaluation, additional elements of project and asset evaluation, as well as risk, capital and decision making with other factors.

Two benchmarking reference documents are provided, Benchmarking: What’s your building’s energy IQ, from the U.S. Department of Energy, and a Benchmarking Tools Matrix.

A resource list is also provided for the course. This offers resources on rates/tariffs, electric schedules, and gas schedules.

For orientation purposes, viewers should begin with the ENRG 53_Course Outline_cc.pdf, which offers a description of the course as well as an overview of topics covered through a course outline.

Below is a list of the files contained within the .zip attachment. The size of each file is included in parenthesis.

ENRG-53-Rates-Benchmark-Final-Analysis (13 files, 10.2 MB)

• Utility Rates, Benchmarking and Financial Analysis (1_Understanding Utility Rates.pdf 1.8 MB)
• Utility Rates, Benchmarking and Financial Analysis (1_Understanding Utility Rates.ppt 2 MB)
• Benchmarking (2_Benchmarking.pdf 393 KB)
• Benchmarking (2_Benchmarking.ppt 310 KB)
• Introduction to economics and cost (3_Financial Analysis.pdf 608 KB)
• Introduction to economics and cost (3_Financial Analysis.ppt 461 KB)
• Benchmarking: What's your building's energy IQ?(Benchmarking - LBNL.pdf 3.6 MB)
• Benchmarking: What's your building's energy IQ? (Benchmarking Tools Matrix.pdf 233 KB)
• Course Outline (ENRG 53_Course Outline.docx 27 KB)
• Course Outline (ENRG 53_Course Outline.pdf 403 KB)
• Resource List (Resource List.docx 16 KB
• Resource List (Resource List.pdf 299 KB)