How to make buildings more energy efficient advice, Green home guide, Eco property design

How to Make Your Entire Building More Energy Efficient

25 January 2025

As the owner of a business or organization, it’s important for you to think proactively about the value and impact of your physical building. Not only is this location responsible for the majority of your productive work as an organization, but it’s also going to represent some of your biggest business expenses.

Prudent business owners are making a proactive effort to upgrade their buildings to be more energy efficient. But what are the best strategies to accomplish this?

Strategies for Energy Efficiency

These strategies can help you upgrade the energy efficiency of practically any building.

Get an energy efficiency audit.
One of your first steps is to get an energy efficiency audit. If you have the extra money, you can pay for a professional energy auditor to thoroughly inspect and review your building, producing a report that you can act on. If you’re working with a tight budget, or if you just want to go at your own pace, you can conduct this energy audit yourself.

Essentially, you want to measure and analyze the biggest sources of energy in your building and determine how your building is getting that energy. From there, you can make significant changes to reduce the amount of energy you use and practice smarter energy generation and consumption overall.
Invest in efficient equipment and appliances.
Next, invest in energy efficient equipment and appliances, which are going to be disproportionate consumers of energy in your building. HVAC equipment gets a lot of attention in this area, but even niche pieces of equipment, like water cooled chillers, offer varying degrees of energy efficiency. Sometimes, spending a little extra means greatly reducing the amount of energy you need for various applications, ultimately making your business more sustainable.

Upgrade the insulation, windows, and doors. Energy efficiency suffers when there is a lack of insulation in a building. If the air inside your building leaks out, or if the air outside your building leaks in, your heating and cooling performance is going to suffer. You can mitigate this by improving the insulation in your building, as well as sealing or upgrading your windows and doors. Even tiny air leaks can have a massive impact on your performance.
Check your HVAC performance. Perhaps you’ve already replaced or upgraded your HVAC equipment, but it’s also important to analyze its performance. For example, dirty ducts can compromise the effectiveness of your system, and it’s important to replace your air filters regularly if you want to ensure smooth, efficient performance.
Practice ongoing monitoring. Next, implement a process for ongoing monitoring. It’s important for you to keep an eye on how much energy your building is using, and how that energy is being used. This way, you can proactively identify excessive energy usage and act on it before it becomes a bigger problem.

Invest in routine maintenance. Similarly, investing in routine maintenance can greatly improve your energy efficiency. Even simple measures, like maintaining and repairing your biggest pieces of equipment, can help you use less energy. As an added bonus, it could save you money on costly repairs and prolong the lifespan of your equipment.
Mitigate costs with renewable energy. Renewable energy is equivalent in value to traditionally generated energy, but it’s typically much more sustainable – and often cheaper. If you have the ability and the money, consider investing in solar panels, wind turbines, and other sources of renewable energy.

Why Invest in the Sustainability of Your Building?

Why should you care about the energy efficiency and overall sustainability of your building?

Cost savings. One of the greatest benefits of energy efficiency is cost savings. When you use less energy, your energy bills will be lower. If you generate your own energy, they’ll be even lower than that. And if you practice consistent monitoring and maintenance, you’ll save money in other ways as well.
Easier maintenance. In many cases, sustainable solutions also support easier and less required maintenance. With newer, more advanced equipment, you’ll suffer less downtime and you’ll spend less time making annoying repairs.

Sustainability. For many building owners, environmental sustainability is its own reward. Using less energy means producing fewer emissions, which is beneficial for the environment.
Reputation. There’s a reason why most businesses now publish annual sustainability reports. The general public increasingly cares about climate change and other topics related to environmental sustainability. Improving your building and changing your energy policies is a way to curate favor with anyone invested in environmental or sustainability topics. With a more efficient building, your company’s reputation can flourish.

With these strategies and a proactive, sustainable mindset, you can greatly increase the energy efficiency of your building. From saving money to improving your reputation, benefits typically far outweigh the costs.

Comments on this guide to How to make buildings more energy efficient – Architectural Tips for a Green Home article are welcome.