Better equipped to face the energy crisis with the tertiary and BACS decrees

The tertiary building stock represents 44% of energy consumption in France, of which 30% is lost in operation. One of the most effective ways to meet the challenge of energy sobriety expected by the government would therefore be to reduce energy consumption in the building. This is precisely the object of Tertiary Eco Energy device , which requires real estate players to reduce the energy consumption of tertiary, public and private, new and existing buildings of more than 1,000 m² by 2050. The first energy reduction threshold is -40% by 2030, then -50% by 2040, and finally -60% in 2050.

Measurement, the starting point for energy savings

The means to achieve this are not fixed by the decree. Nevertheless, studies have shown that a building measurement and control system is already enough to save 40% energy. Digital technologies are therefore particularly useful in the current context. Measurement technologies first, to know how energy is consumed in the building and then to act. However, more than 90% of buildings are still not connected to software for viewing their energy consumption. Fortunately, this is changing in response to the energy crisis as more operators implement metering plans. This is a good practice, since measurement by metering and sub-metering solutions makes it possible to understand where the most consumption is in your building and to identify the equipment on which action should be taken. If it emerges from the analyzes that the lighting consumes more than normal, it would undoubtedly be wise to install LEDs instead of the old bulbs, or that the heating is the biggest item in the energy bill, it would be advisable to buy a heat pump to replace an old gas boiler. In addition, to come back to the regulations, the monitoring of the measurement constitutes the basis of the tertiary decree, which requires knowing the consumption of its building and uploading this measurement data on the OPERAT platform of the ADEME, to show what are reductions in energy consumption achieved.

“More than 90% of buildings are still not connected to software for viewing their energy consumption. »

The obligation of piloting in the tertiary sector

In the regulatory panoply made available to players in the tertiary sector, the BACS decree requires the installation of a building automation and control system, or BMS (Technical Building Management) in tertiary buildings equipped with heating or air conditioning with a nominal power greater than 290 kW, by January 1, 2025. One hundred and fifty thousand buildings are concerned in France. And with the constant rise in energy costs, installing a BMS is more profitable than ever. In January 2022, the return on investment was estimated at 3 to 5 years. Today, it is faster (between 1 and 3 years) and to this is added the Energy Savings Certificates system to finance its BMS. Let’s take a concrete example: that of a Parisian building with 3,000 m² of office space. The acquisition of a class B BMS (according to the categorization from A to D, from “high energy efficiency” to “non-efficient from an energy point of view” of standard NF EN ISO 52120-1:2022) cost 26,105 euros in January 2022, with a potential savings of 10,224 euros per year and a CEE premium of 9,585 euros. The ROI was only about a year and a half. So why are only 6% of buildings equipped with a control system?

“With the constant rise in energy costs, the installation of a BMS is more profitable than ever. The return on investment is quick and is estimated between 1 and 3 years! »

The requirement for a maintenance contract for the steering system

In addition to the obligation of a BMS, the BACS decree also requires that it be properly maintained. With this in mind, Schneider Electric has added a service component to its latest generation BMS, to check that the control system is working well at all times and that its equipment is in the best configuration. This solution provides all the necessary information to the building, identifying malfunctions at the server and controller level to resolve them proactively. It thus makes it possible to divide by 3 the number of maintenance operations and to deliver the right levels of energy efficiency!

A BMS for more flexibility

Finally, with the risk for this winter of a power cut in the electricity network, the electricity transmission manager RTE and the ecological transition agency ADEME, supported by the Ministry for Ecological Transition, have set up a new service, ecoWatt, to help the French to better consume electricity from an alert system ecoWatt green (normal consumption), ecoWatt orange (tense situation) and ecoWatt red (cut unavoidable if consumption is not lowered of energy). However, the BMS makes it possible to automate the eco-gestures defined by RTE to save energy, use it at the best time and allow consumption to be modulated in the tertiary building in the event of an ecoWatt red alert. With energy management, operators can thus limit consumption in unoccupied premises, anticipate the rise in temperature of offices for the arrival of occupants, lower ventilation, reduce interior lighting, or even postpone the charging of electric vehicles. In all, seven eco-gestures recommended by RTE can easily be controlled over the long term!

Measurement and control: which solutions to choose?

The performance of some software for measurement monitoringsuch as EcoStruxure^TM Power Monitoring Expert in large buildings, or EcoStruxure^TM Facility Expert in those of more modest size, no longer needs to be proven. Power Monitoring Expert (PME) is a multi-fluid, multi-site and interoperable energy management system. Facility Expert (FE) is Plug&Play supervision software that is easy to integrate and use. These tools make it possible to collect data, aggregate it and contextualize it, to identify sources of energy saving, but also to constantly know the state of its installation so that it operates longer. They are already widely tested with numerous feedbacks. Worldwide, there are 25,000 installations with SMEs and the number of small building operators satisfied with FE is in the hundreds, in France alone. Discover in video the example of the University of Grenoble Alpes, equipped with PME, connected to more than 300,000 measurement units in 500,000 m² of buildings on a 175-hectare campus.

Above, EBO has a supervision that federates all the automatons, while providing a man-machine interface. It thus constitutes the backbone of the building which collects 95% of the information. Bonus with EBO: because it is interoperable, it is able to trace data from all types of building equipment, via the Bacnet IP communication protocol. Simply enter the IP address of the equipment to communicate with it. But who says interoperability, also says risk of security breach since the equipment all speaks with the same voice. This is why EBO is one of the first systems to integrate the Bacnet Secure protocol, to secure all exchanges. If that were not enough, it also has the Secure Boot component, a firmware that guarantees that there will be no risk of tampering when starting the PLC. Finally, to guarantee the comfort of use of the company’s applications by users, EBO complies with the SAML 2.0 authentication standard, coupled with the client’s Active Directory to manage the password policy of employees in complete security.

Schneider Electric has also added a service component, called Building Advisor , to its BMS EBO. The latest version of Building Advisor also allows you to launch alarms from EBO, in the event of a malfunction or a peak in consumption. It also constantly monitors the condition of the building’s equipment, for a longer lifespan.

To know which levers to activate to optimize the energy efficiency of buildingsconsult our brochure which details the four steps to reduce energy consumption.