Modifying Energy Auditors Behavior to Align with Facility Owner's Needs

Tabitha Sprau Coulter, Pennsylvania State University

An energy audit is used to collect important information about an existing facility's systems, geometry, use type, and energy consumption. Through performing an energy audit, the facility owner and those individuals analyzing the building are able to get a sense of how the building systems are performing, while identifying potential retrofit upgrades. However, the current lack of energy auditing standards means audit outcomes vary depending on the individual performing the audit. The data collected during the audit process is often used to develop a baseline energy model, and to assist with contextualizing proposed retrofit upgrades. With facility owner's using audit data to support decisions on what retrofit upgrades to pursue, it is important that the appropriate information is collected.

The proposed study will look at two laboratory facilities in the context of experimental case studies. For each case study building, both a typical audit and an audit where the industry member participates in a pre-audit planning activity will be conducted. The pre-audit planning activity aligns the data collection process with the owner's goals and priorities. While performing the energy audits of the laboratory buildings, the industry members will be shadowed by an embedded researcher. The auditors will be asked to 'think aloud', describing the general process they are implementing along with the data being collected throughout the audit; while the embedded researcher collects video and audio recordings. After completing the audit process, the industry members will develop energy audit reports that will be delivered to the facility owner for review. The research will investigate the impact of participating in the pre-audit planning activity. In analyzing the data collected, the researcher will look at how the pre-audit planning activity impacted the overall audit process. Facility owner representatives will also review and evaluate the audit reports to identify if the pre-audit planning activity resulted in the development of audit reports that had an increase in value.

Learning Objectives

  • The research looks to develop and understand the impact of a pre-audit planning activity, which aligns audit data collection with owner's goals and priorities.
  • Analyzing and understand how participating in the developed pre-audit planning activity influences the energy auditors behavior as they are collecting data during the energy audit.
  • Identify the increased value the pre-audit planning activity has to the facility owners by providing the facility owner representatives with the opportunity to review and evaluate the energy audit reports. The evaluation will look at what aspect of audit reports are most important and influential to their decision process.

Biography:

After receiving her M.S. Degree in Architectural Engineering from Penn State, Tabitha Sprau Coulter spent time working as a Mechanical Engineer for KlingStubbins. Tabitha returned to PSU as a Ph.D. candidate in 2011. While at PSU, Tabitha has been involved with the Navy Yard EEB Hub - working on a retrofit user interface that will be used to collect initial building data. Tabitha currently has an NSF grant through the CarbonEARTH program and is expected to graduate with her Ph.D. in August 2014.

 

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