An energy audit is a study of an energy costs and efficiency. An energy audit, review, or assessment for a property is precisely what it sounds like. An audit will evaluate each and every energy use in your home and detail every aspect, just as any audit that is conducted on finances, projects, or businesses. Simply put, a home energy audit is a process that enables you to pinpoint energy leaks in your house and determine what actions you can take to increase energy efficiency. To guarantee optimum efficiency and savings, every homeowner should do a home energy audit every two to three years. Energy audits are the first step in figuring out a home's energy usage.

It requires a detailed research and analysis of energy use in homes, which involves looking at the tools, procedures, and usage habits of users. By assuring efficiency, this enables a homeowner to identify areas where they may save money. A house owner can minimise energy waste and improve energy efficiency by using an energy audit to identify opportunities. A homeowner can benefit from using less energy by giving their property a more environmentally friendly reputation in the neighbourhood.

You have the option of conducting a home energy audit yourself or hiring a professional to do it for you. You can identify opportunities to save energy and money no matter which path you choose when conducting a home energy audit. In addition, it evaluates any potential health and safety problems in your house. But a qualified professional's energy audit is a helpful tool for figuring out how your home consumes electricity and locating places where energy waste and efficiency might be decreased. Energy Project Africa (EPA) has access to highly qualified engineers with diverse energy audit skills that can change your household's energy consumption into a cost-effective one.

The main purpose of an energy audit should be to confirm your presumptions about where you can conserve energy in your house. "Ideally, an audit should provide information on how to meet a home's energy needs." The need could just be to reduce costs, but it could also be to increase the supply of energy. Additionally, you'll be modelling good behaviour for your family and giving yourself a greater understanding of how you consume energy on a daily basis and the kinds of steps you can take going forward to avoid doing so excessively. Understanding the full range of motivations for considering a home energy audit is crucial in order to counteract these claims.

Reasons to Perform a Home Energy Audit

The only way to fully comprehend a home's consumption patterns, how they may be connected, and identify the most significant energy users is to study all energy-consuming rooms and equipment. This is the most effective approach. We will emphasise how the building's many rooms should be prioritised to produce the most savings for homeowners who have a large number of energy-consuming rooms on the property. Due to our familiarity with energy management and where homes utilise energy, working with EPA is a pretty simple process that just involves a walkthrough of your property to identify potential problem areas. Knowing what an energy audit does, you can now look into whether your home could benefit from carrying out one. The major benefit is, of course, on the bottom line; you could be wasting money on energy that isn't needed. You may never understand how much money you could save if you don't check into what you're consuming.

Safe Money

Depending on the type of improvements you make to your home, the very first benefit of completing a home energy audit is that it will help you save money on your electricity costs. By completing the improvements suggested by your home energy audit, you may save anywhere from 5 to 30 percent on your electricity cost.

Identify Your Potential Energy-saving Opportunities

An energy auditor may identify the areas of your home where the most energy is being lost, and they can then recommend adjustments to make in order to save energy and cut your electricity costs. You can take action to address the issue once it is determined which areas of your home need energy improvements. An audit can indicate that you need to clean your air ducts, adjust the settings on your appliances, replace your kitchen equipment with energy-efficient versions, or switch the shower head on your bathroom sink to use less hot water. Installing a solar energy system, upgrading the insulation in your walls, or replacing outdated window weather stripping are all significant enhancements. You'll know where to start more clearly with the guidance provided by your energy auditor.

Understand Your Energy Usage

An evaluation of your home called an energy audit looks at how much energy is currently being used. You can learn where and how energy is used by conducting an energy audit. You may transform your home or way of life for the better by being aware of where and how your home utilises (or wastes) energy.

Reduce Carbon Footprint

Your carbon footprint will naturally decrease when you consume less energy, which can lower greenhouse gas emissions. You can lessen your impact on the environment in a number of ways, including by repairing air leaks, installing proper insulation, utilizing as much natural light as possible, switching out inefficient equipment with energy-efficient ones, and using less electricity for heating.

Save Energy

A professional energy audit not only focuses on the energy business but also on short-term and long-term power bill savings. The two most frequent causes of air leakage are inadequate insulation and leaky windows. Your energy requirements can be significantly reduced by simply fixing these two issues. The most efficient approach to conserve money and energy is by doing these two things together, even though there may be additional items on the list. A reliable government rebate expert can also provide you with advice on energy efficiency.

Ensure Health and Safety

Your top focus should be the safety of your family. A business's safety and health are assessed during an energy audit. The audit team makes use of cutting-edge equipment and methods to look for electrical or other hazards, check that the wiring is installed correctly to prevent electrical fires, check for fuel leaks in the furnace, and perform combustion appliance zone testing on all combustion fuel-powered appliances. Additionally, business owners frequently discover air leakage around doors, inadequate insulation, or unwelcome moisture sources during an audit. Once moisture issues have been located, action may be done to maintain the optimal humidity level in the business, which will benefit everyone's health, especially those with allergies or asthma.

Increase Business’s Resale Value

One of the best business renovations you can make to raise property values if you ever want to sell the house or rent it out is to make it more energy efficient. Prospective buyers place a high value on energy-efficient businesses with upgrades like solar panels, a solar hot water system, additional insulation, and energy-efficient temperature management. Even if you don't intend to sell your house anytime soon, these improvements might eventually recoup their costs.

Boost Energy Efficiency in the Business

Since energy audits are intended to increase your business's energy efficiency, you can anticipate that they will assist you in creating a detailed improvement plan.

Insulation and air leaks - For instance, an energy audit can assist you in identifying air leaks that occur from cracks in your walls, ceiling, or flooring. A check of heat loss due to inadequate insulation may be part of your energy audit. Particularly in older businesses, the insulation may not be adequate.
Heating, cooling, and electronics - In addition to checking your heating and cooling systems, such as your hot water heater, thermostat, and air conditioner, an energy audit would also inspect these components. These items can consume more energy than usual when they're not operating well, and an energy audit will be able to inform you whether you need to clean them, replace their filters, or buy newer equipment. For instance, if you determine that using central heating is a waste of energy, you can switch to in-room heating so that you only pay for heating in the areas that you are using. Similarly, you can test your devices and appliances as part of your audit to determine how much electricity they are consuming.

Another advantage to mention is that it aids with energy strategies and ensures that your building premises is on track to fulfill impending and present laws. As the government works to meet its environmental goals, more limitations on energy consumption. An energy audit might assist you in focusing on areas where you can improve compliance.

EPA Energy Audits Process

Firstly, we conduct preliminary audits or building assessments to identify no-cost and low-cost energy-saving solutions. An evaluation of your energy costs and a brief site survey of your business premises are among the activities.

We also conduct engineering analysis and energy survey Audits to uncover no-cost and low-cost opportunities, as well as suggestions tailored to your budget and prospective energy savings. An in-depth investigation of energy expenses, energy usage, and physical attributes, as well as a more refined assessment of how energy is used in your property, are carried out.

We offer sound advice and financial analysis that detailed analysis of modification Audits. This includes a process where the EPA engages in monitoring, data collecting, and engineering analysis in addition to the tasks above. We will work with you to establish the level of audit you require based on your project goals and available budget. A Level I audit could give conclusions that make the expense of the audit justifiable for smaller facilities without a substantial budget. Due to the intricacies of a larger building that has never been inspected, a Level II or Level III audit would be more appropriate due to the complexities of systems and potential savings opportunities.

Each step of the energy audit is led by the EPA, but the business owners play important roles and should be actively involved throughout the process. At EPA, we begins by studying your utility data, building or system diagrams, and other facility information to do a preliminary energy consumption evaluation. To account for seasonal variations and patterns of energy usage, we will gather and examine at least two years of utility data throughout the energy use study. Monthly utility bill data is the most typical; however, utilities are increasingly making hourly or more frequent interval meter data available. This analysis should encompass all forms of energy (electricity, gas, oil, and water).

EPA will use this information to compute the Energy Utilization Index (EUI) value (annual energy use/square footage) and energy end uses for your facility. The EUI and base energy load allow us to compare this data to energy consumption in similar buildings and systems, illustrating the magnitude of possible energy savings and providing an early estimate of prospective savings.

Our team of experts will also looks for changes in energy consumption over time and possible explanations. We then generate a preliminary report, which will include a summary of data, graphs, and other visualizations for easy interpretation. The results of this study can help choose the level of audit to do; we will also suggest recommendations in the audit report.

Our trained engineers will undertake a physical examination of your facility and its operations after the preliminary review.

The site assessment should be actively participated in by the building staff (facility managers, operations and management staff, and essential contractors as needed). In the framework of the physical inspection of equipment and systems, EPA team will identify adjustments that building personnel can adopt immediately. Building staff can also provide their views on building conditions. These encounters encourage building workers to participate in the energy audit process and take ownership of facility maintenance and energy efficiency.

Any past audits and recent or planned building improvements should be disclosed to the EPA team prior to the site evaluation. You may also need to confirm ahead of time that the EPA has permission or security access to perform particular duties, such as photographing the rooms, or collecting data from control systems.

EPA’s team of data analysts will begin the energy and cost analysis after collecting the essential data for your building. The study takes into consideration baseline energy use, data acquired during the onsite evaluation, and the financial consequences of energy efficiency measure installations. To ensure that the study is fairly compared to other investment options and that cash flows match expectations, we will seek your collaboration for a strong understanding of your economic methodology and business criteria before beginning the research.

To prevent results that give too much or too little detail, we ensure that your project goals should drive the analysis methodology you use. For larger structures or buildings with complicated mechanical systems, typical analysis approaches include spreadsheet analysis based on engineering formulas that account for fluctuations in time of day and season and whole-building hourly energy consumption analysis. Level II and Level III audits use more complicated methodologies that allow for more precise assessments of possible energy savings.

Furthermore, energy audits do not have to be difficult, costly, or time-consuming. Instead, by just strolling around the facility, our team of experts conducts an effective energy audit of your company's energy usage. With some ideas on how to complete your own energy assessment, Energy Project Africa (EPA) can help you get your energy usage under control. An energy audit can transform your energy consumption at business into cost-efficient energy consumption.

The energy savings potential will be clearly provided in no cost, low cost, and high cost categories, and EPA will prioritize them in the report. Each of the discovered savings opportunities will have a payback and quantified carbon savings listed alongside it. The free choices are usually tied to behavioral modification, notably in the area of lighting, and can be implemented right away. Based on the energy audit findings and recommendations, an internal strategy should be developed and a decision taken on how to proceed with the recommendations. Upgrades to lighting, heating, and industrial processes can alter a company, but these opportunities are frequently neglected by executive teams who are more concerned with increasing revenue than decreasing costs." As a result, EPA shows the survey and reports findings to the business owners so that they may ask questions and thoroughly comprehend the findings and possibilities of the recommendations.

Audits undertaken by inexperienced personnel or audits sponsored by a vendor and targeted toward a certain technology or product, on the other hand, may emphasize simple individual energy conservation recommendations while overlooking other substantial opportunities. Unqualified auditors may also make recommendations that result in little energy savings, or even worse, increased energy use or equipment damage. While cost is an important consideration when hiring an energy auditor, it should not be the only one. Experience, certifications, and successful past project samples are all important factors to consider when hiring an energy auditor. EPA team of engineers and data analysts are well trained and experienced in the field of energy audit to give your business the most effective and efficient energy which reduces the amount of money you spend on energy on daily basis.

E.P.A. (Energy Projects Africa) through her Energy audits and feasibility solution helps stakeholders make data-driven decisions in the clean energy space via real-time quantitative research and feasibility studies. If you need a partner with hands-on local expertise in the renewable energy space or any of our bespoke solutions/services, kindly visit Mail hello@energy-projects.africa to learn more.