Before tracking and reporting Cost Avoidance it is necessary to configure global, place and meter Cost Avoidance settings.

Click Tools – Options - Global and select the Cost Avoidance tab. The parameters defined from this tab are global settings that will apply to all newly-created meters.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Setting or changing the first five global settings will not affect any existing meters – you must edit existing meters individually using the CAP tab in Meter Properties, or you can edit many at once using the Global Update tool.

Baseline Start:
The day that begins the pre-retrofit baseline period.

Baseline Length: 
The number of months (12 to 36) in the baseline period. Baselines of over 12 months will not be weather adjusted.

Savings Start: 
The day on which Cost Avoidance calculations will begin. Normally this is the day following the end of the baseline period, but in some cases you may have a ‘deadband’ period between end of baseline and beginning of savings calculations.

Balance Point Temperatures:
EnergyCAP defaults to 55°F which is generally a better default value than 65°F because most modern commercial buildings have heating/cooling switchover temperatures below 65°F. All degree day calculations in weather reports and Weather Manager degree day PowerView charts are based upon these settings.

Cost Avoidance Limits:
These global settings are used every time the Cost Avoidance savings processor is run, so if you change a value here you must re-calculate savings for all meters, all months in order for the change to take effect.

AUC Safety Min and Max:
The Cost Avoidance savings processor normally uses Average Unit Cost (AUC) of the current bill to calculate the value for savings due to Cost Avoidance. That is, if the current cost of electricity is $0.10/KWH, then a savings of 10,000 KWH will show a Cost Avoidance of $1,000. In some cases, however, the current AUC can be abnormal:

EXAMPLE: Due to a shut-down for construction or remodeling, the current bill was reduced from a “typical” consumption of 1,000 KWH to a mere 50 KWH. The bill cost of $50 is due mainly to service and base charges, so the calculated current bill AUC is skewed to $1.00/KWH. If the baseline bill for the same month was $95 for 1,000 KWH, the "normal" Cost Avoidance calculation would show 950 KWH saved x $1.00/KWH = $950 Cost Avoidance, which is clearly inaccurate, since the bill was only reduced from $95 to $50.

The AUC Safety min/max values define an acceptable ratio between the Average Unit Cost (AUC) of the current bill and the AUC of the corresponding baseline bill.  If the user-configurable AUC Safety min/max (minimum or maximum) thresholds are exceeded, the Cost Avoidance savings processor will use the AUC of the unadjusted baseline bill, rather than the AUC of the current bill, to calculate the Cost Avoidance value. This protocol helps preclude an unreasonable Cost Avoidance value, particularly when the current bill AUC may be legitimately questioned.

The default AUC Safety minimum setting is 0.5 and the default AUC maximum setting is 5.0.  With these default settings, if the AUC of the current bill is less than half of the AUC of the baseline bill, the Cost Avoidance savings processor will use the AUC of the unadjusted baseline bill when calculating Cost Avoidance.  Similarly, if the AUC of the current bill is more than five times greater than the AUC of the baseline bill, the Cost Avoidance processor will use the AUC of the unadjusted baseline bill to calculate Cost Avoidance.  If the ratio of the AUC of the current bill to the AUC of the corresponding baseline bill falls within the AUC ‘safety net’ defined by the min/max values, the Cost Avoidance savings processor will use the AUC of the current bill to calculate Cost Avoidance (unless overridden by a CAP adjustment).

Min Degree Day Per Day: 
This value can be used to stop weather adjustments in mild weather. When the daily average for degree days falls below the input value, a baseline weather adjustment for the month will not be made.

EXAMPLE:
In the base year there were 10 heating degree days in October; in the current year there were twenty heating degree days in the same month. Even though the weather was twice as cold from a degree day standpoint, you consider it to be irrelevant. If you set the minimum degree day per day value to 1.0, no weather adjustment will be made because the month must have at least 31 degree days (an average of 1.0 per day) to qualify for weather adjustments.

Use the Global Meter Update option from the Cost Avoidance menu to update Cost Avoidance settings for multiple meters at once.

NOTE: Beginning with Release 6.1, EnergyCAP Users with Cost Avoidance privileges are only able to to make global changes in areas of the EnergyCAP program for which they have been granted corresponding access in User Permissions.

To use this feature:

1. Click Cost Avoidance > Global Meter Update. The Globally Update Meters window will open.
2. Input the desired meter parameter changes for any or all of the available parameters. Make sure to activate the Update checkboxes for each setting that will be globally updated.

NOTE: Cost Avoidance adjustments for weather will NOT be performed on meters that are using a  baseline greater than 12 months.

1. Click the Filter button. The Set Filter window will open.
2. Select the desired Place and Commodity filters and click OK to save the changes and exit the Set Filter window.
3. Click Update Meters to perform the Global Update.

1. When done, click Close to close the Global Update window.

NOTE: The Include Meter in Cost Avoidance checkbox must be checked in order for a meter to be included in Cost Avoidance reports, charts and calculations. The purpose of the checkbox is to enable the user to exclude certain meters from Cost Avoidance calculations if those meters are irrelevant to energy management activities. The include/exclude checkbox for meters can also be managed individually from the Cost Avoidance Manager. Just highlight/select the meter from the Cost Avoidance tree view, then check or uncheck the Include Meter in Cost Avoidance checkbox.

A handful of Cost Avoidance options are not configurable from the Global settings window. These settings, which must be adjusted from the CAP tab in the Meter Properties window, include:

Apply building area adjustments to baseline?:

The Apply building area adjustments to baseline? option, when enabled, will automatically adjust for changes in the floor area of the parent building (the place to which the meter is directly assigned in the Facility Manager tree).

During Cost Avoidance calculations, EnergyCAP reviews the floor area of the related building (as recorded in the Facility Manager Place Properties window under the Building tab) for the baseline period and the current month. If the floor area values are different, the percent difference is calculated and the baseline is adjusted up or down by that percentage to match the floor area associated with the current bill.

EXAMPLE: The floor area today is 10% greater than in the same month of the baseline year (based on the area in effect as of the first day of the bill period).  The baseline usage will be adjusted upwards by 10% to reflect what the usage would have been in the base year had the floor area been the same as it is today.

NOTE: If it is desirable to adjust for floor area changes but not on the percentage difference basis described above, uncheck the Apply building area adjustments to baseline? option and then create a CAP Special Adjustment to define the appropriate floor area compensation.

Track Demand?:

If this is an electric meter, you can track demand in the Cost Avoidance Manager separately from usage.
To enable Demand tracking, click the Track Demand? checkbox.

Cost Adjustment Method:

There are two Cost Adjustment methods.  The default method is Current Average Unit Cost.  This option uses current cost for the valuation of current and baseline usage, in accordance with fundamental Cost Avoidance philosophy. The alternative method, Net Cost Difference, performs the valuation for the current period usage with current cost and the baseline period using baseline cost. Usage and demand are ignored; Cost Avoidance is calculated as the net difference between the cost of the baseline bill and the cost of the current bill. This seldom-used method may appropriately be used when, in the judgment of the energy manager, use of current costs for valuation of baseline usage would reduce the reliability of the cost avoidance estimate.

NOTE: Use CAP Adjustments for additional costing options such as marginal unit price.

Meters inherit the weather station of the immediate parent Place (building) so in order for weather adjustments to function, each place  must be assigned to the appropriate weather station. With EnergyCAP Release 6.0 SP2 and later, weather stations are assigned automatically to a Place when the address information (ZIP code) is entered. However, weather stations may be added or changed manually using the procedure below.

NOTE ON CANADIAN POSTAL CODES: Input format must be LNL NLN
WHERE: L=letter and N=number. A SPACE is required between each 3-character grouping.

To assign a building (place) to an existing weather station:

1. Click Setup from the Navigation Bar and select the Facilities icon. the Facility Manager will open.
   

   

2. Right-click the desired Place from the Facility tree and select Properties. The Place Properties window will open.
   

   

3. Click the General tab from the Place Properties window and look for the Weather: drop-down box.
   

   

4. Click the Weather: drop-down arrow to reveal a list of installed weather stations for your organization.
   

   

NOTE: If there are no weather stations installed (e.g., the drop-down box is empty), you will need to complete the Setup process for weather stations (see Weather Station Setup topic).

1. Click to select the weather station associated with the place. Then click OK to save your settings and exit the Place Properties window.

EnergyCAP’s Cost Avoidance processor performs all of the weather adjustment and Cost Avoidance calculation on demand so that the values will be immediately available for reports and charts.

It is advisable to run the processor immediately after:

• entering or importing billing data
• adding or revising CAP adjustments
• making EnergyCAP configuration changes

To run the processor:

1. Click the Cost Avoidance tab from the Navigation Bar. The Cost Avoidance Manager will be displayed.
2. Click Cost Avoidance--Calculate Savings from the Cost Avoidance menu options.
   
   The Calculate Savings window will open.
   

   

3. Select the desired calculation options per the instructions below using the window control features:

• To reprocess the entire baseline, click the ReProcess Baseline checkbox option. Unchecking the ReProcess Baseline checkbox will improve performance, and is recommended if you have not entered or edited any bills or settings that affect the baseline year.
• To ignore weather for purposes of Cost Avoidance calculation, click the Ignore weather adjustments checkbox.
• To reduce processing time to the last two months of recent bills, select the Limit Processing … checkbox. But be sure to uncheck this box if you have entered or updated any bills or settings that affect prior months.
• Click the Filter button if it is necessary to limit the processing to selected meters. The Set Filter window will open.
  
  Select the desired place and/or commodity filters; then click OK to save filter options and exit the Set Filter window.
• If desirable, use the Ignore Special Adjustments checkbox to filter out Cost Avoidance Special Adjustments by Type (as selected from the drop-down list).

1. Click the Calc Savings button to start the processor. While the processor is running, the Calc Savings button will be grayed out, and the Cancel button will change to a Stop button.
   

CAUTION: If you click the Stop button, the processor will stop but the Cost Avoidance calculations may be incomplete.

1. When calculations are complete, the Calculate Savings window will close automatically. If calculations have not been completed, you may exit the Calculate Savings window by clicking the Cancel button or the "X" on the window title bar to close the window.

NOTES:

• To check/verify the Cost Avoidance calculations, review the relevant Cost Avoidance data; if necessary, re-calculate with any special adjustment types included (uncheck the Ignore Special Adjustments checkbox). Then compare the resulting data.
• There is no harm in running the Calculate Savings processor. Each time the processor is run, the Cost Avoidance values will be re-calculated and prior values will be updated if the data has changed.
• User permissions impact the scope of the Cost Avoidance Processor. No meters are processed that are outside of the user's topmost place permission.

To view Cost Avoidance for an individual meter, select the desired meter from the Facilities Tree in the Cost Avoidance Manager. Then click the Savings tab to view savings results.

The displayed data table lists all bills subsequent to the Savings Start Date that have been processed by the Calculate Savings processor. The Wthr Htg (Weather Heating) and Wthr Clg (Weather Cooling) columns are flagged with an “X” if the savings for that month have been affected by a heating or cooling weather adjustment. The CA% of Act Cost column shows the percentage of monthly actual cost represented by Cost Avoidance.  Values highlighted in red indicate negative Cost Avoidance.  Values in green indicate positive Cost Avoidance (savings).  Values in yellow are positive Cost Avoidance that exceed 50% of the actual total utility cost for the month.  Such a high value, although attainable with aggressive energy management efforts, should be reviewed to ensure that the cost avoidance estimate is reasonable; hence the yellow ‘caution’ color.

Viewing Daily Savings Details

To drill down into the daily savings details for a selected meter:

Click on the bar chart or on the table entry for the desired billing month.  The Savings Details window will open, displaying additional supporting calculations and details, including daily costs associated with the bill.

NOTE: The Savings Details window will not open if a node in the Facilities Tree other than a METER has been selected.

If demand applies, click the Demand tab to view the demand calculation results.

Explaining Monthly Savings

Click the Explain Savings button from the Savings Details window. The Explanation of Savings window will open.

The bar on the left (Actual Baseline Use) represents the “raw” baseline use for the month, separated into weather (if applicable) and non-weather components.

The bar on the right (Actual Current) is the actual use for the “current” month.

The bar in the middle (W/O Cost Use) is the adjusted baseline use for the month. The middle bar is the baseline after it has been adjusted to today’s conditions.  These adjustments may include weather, floor area and other adjustments.

Cost Avoidance is not calculated as raw baseline vs. current but rather as adjusted baseline vs. current. The green bar shows the difference between adjusted baseline and today – the avoided use.  This value may be positive or negative.  Positive values indicate use avoidance. Negative values indicate increased use. The usage values are then assessed at current per-unit utility rates to determine the associated Cost Avoidance.

NOTE: A supporting Cost Avoidance report is the CAP06 – Baseline Report.  This report displays the day-by-day “raw” baseline values which are also shown in the Explanation of Day-by-Day Baseline Adjustments list box in the Savings Detail window.  The Explanation of Day-by-Day Baseline Adjustments list box also indicates which additional adjustments have been applied to each day of the billing period.

From the Cost Avoidance Manager, click on  the displayed billing data or related graph point for the selected meter to open the Savings Detail window. Then click the Manually Adjust button from the Savings Detail window. The Manually Adjust window will open.

Input the desired values for Without CAP Use, Demand and Cost (i.e. the adjusted baseline values). Then click the Save button. The Cost Avoidance values will be calculated using the new information.

NOTE: If desired, click the Zero Savings button from the Manually Adjust window to zero out savings for a particular month.  This means that the month will be no loss/no gain in the case of a special condition or circumstance that disqualifies the month from normal Cost Avoidance calculations.

After making any manual entry you should enter a descriptive memo documenting the need for the manual adjustment.

To vew the results of the baseline weather analysis for a selected meter, click the Use Vs Weather tab from the Cost Avoidance Manager.

Click the Summer or Winter Display option to view the cooling months or the heating months in the data table and associated Use Vs Weather graph.

NOTE: EnergyCAP uses the building Balance Point Temperature (BPT, as set in the Meter Properties window and the CAP tab), as well as the Min[imum] Degree Day Per Day limit (configured in the Cost Avoidance tab of the Options window) to determine which months have sufficiently severe weather to qualify as heating or cooling months (see Tools > Options – Global > Cost Avoidance tab).

The statistical linear regression chart will show the results of plotting each baseline bill (as listed in the table) on the grid:  use/day on the vertical and monthly average degree days on the horizontal.

Since the highest degree day (DD) points are on the right and the highest usage points are at the top, a meter that has a usage vs. weather correlation will have a line that rises from left to right.

The weather normalization settings in the Use Vs Weather tab make it a valuable interactive tool for Cost Avoidance determination. Weather calculations are ordinarily based on a 12-month baseline period. However, EnergyCAP gives you the option of performing more exhaustive analysis based on up to three years of billing data.

To change the analysis Method, click on the radio button corresponding to the preferred method:

• The Combined Method includes all the billing period data points for up to three years in a single-line linear regression analysis.
  

NOTE: The Combined Method only analyzes billing data PRECEDING the End Date for the baseline period, regardless of the date displayed in the Analysis Begins: window.

EXAMPLE: If the baseline period ended 12/31/06, a three-year combined linear regression would use cost/use data from 12/1/04 through 12/31/06. A two-year combined linear regression would use cost/use data from 12/1/05 through 12/31/06.By combining multiple years to provide additional data points for the analysis, it is possible to determine the calculated line slope with higher confidence.

• The Separate Method plots each year of data with a separate regression line. If the Separate Method is chosen, the Analysis Begins: text box will be enabled. To set a beginning date for weather regression analysis, input the desired date of the billing month in the Analysis Begins: text box. Each year of data will be represented on the graph in a different color. The color/shape "key" to the regression graph is indicated to the right of the selected (active) year, which is shown in the "default" green color.
• 

NOTE: The primary purpose of the Separate Method of analysis is to illustrate how the weather sensitivity of a meter may have changed over time. When the regression lines coincide, there has been little change in weather sensitivity. When one regression line intersects the left vertical lower than another yet the slope is the same, this means that the non-weather loads (lighting, plug loads) were less. When the left (Y-axis) intersects are about the same but the slope of one regression line is lower than another, that year was less weather sensitive (possibly due to better controls, lower thermostat settings, improved insulation and equipment, etc.)

• The Off Method turns off multi-year analysis.

To use the results obtained using the Combined method for Cost Avoidance calculations, click on the Wrench button while the relevant data is displayed in the Cost Avoidance Manager. 

The Manual Slope Adjustment window will open.

Enter or verify the Cooling and/or Heating Base Load values, as well as the Use/Degree value (line slope as displayed using the Combined method) using the text fields provided. Click the relevant Use Manual Summer/Winter Values check box(es).

Click OK to close accept the changes and close the window.

Viewing Graphs

From the Cost Avoidance Manager (Cost Avoidance > Savings and Normalizations), navigate to the desired facility or meter group and click the CAP Comparison tab at the bottom of the display to view Use per Day and Cost per Day graphical comparisons (line graph format) for a selected year with the baseline year and the adjusted baseline (Without CAP). Cost Avoidance values are presented in an accompanying bar graph format.  There will be positive savings in any month where the actual monthly value is less than the “Without CAP” (adjusted baseline) value.

The CAP Comparison charts display the ‘raw’ baseline year with a blue line, the adjusted baseline year (called ‘without CAP’) with a green line, and the selected comparison year with a red line. Positive Cost Avoidance (savings) derived from the comparison is indicated with a green bar; relative losses are indicated with a red bar.

NOTES:
Point (arrow) 1 – In the provided example, the currently-selected year (August to July, 2007) is greater than the base year and adjusted base year for the month of December.  The base year and adjusted base year are almost identical, which means there were only small adjustments.  The net result is a loss (negative cost avoidance, represented by the red bar) because the actual was higher than the adjusted base year.

Point (arrow) 2 – The base year was adjusted upwards due to increased unit cost and other independent factors.  The current year is less than the adjusted baseline, so there is a positive cost avoidance (savings).

Point (arrow) 3 – The base year was adjusted downwards due to milder weather and other factors.  The current year is less than the adjusted base, so there is a positive cost avoidance.

To print the graph(s), right-click the graphic display and select the Print Page option.

Viewing Year-to-Year Actual Comparison Charts

Use the Actual Comparison tab from the Cost Avoidance Manager to display USE, COST and DEMAND charts for up to seven years of data using any fiscal year basis.  Data is presented by overlaying annual values, making it convenient to spot abnormal values.

Resizing Actual Comparison Graph Images

To resize the graphs presented in the Actual Comparison tab, move the cursor to the divider line separating them. The cursor will change its shape. Then click and drag with the mouse to resize the graph panel.

Copying Cost Avoidance Graph Images

To copy the graph image to the Windows Clipboard, right-click on the graph. Then select the Copy to Clipboard option.

Printing Cost Avoidance Graph Images

 To print the graph image, right-click on the graph and select the Print Page option.

Displaying Cost Avoidance PowerViews

In addition to the Cost Avoidance module, Cost Avoidance presentment is built into EnergyCAP PowerViews.

To view Cost Avoidance information from the Facility Manager, select the desired meter and click the Cost Avoidance tab.

A quick way to view cost avoidance information from many important meters is to use the Meter Group (Setup > Groups) functionality to create the desired meter list. Double-click a meter from the Group list to display its Facility Manager Powerview. Once the Cost Avoidance window is open for one of the meters in the list, click on the Groups icon to return to the meter list to select a different meter.