The Many Flavors of Advanced M&V

In New England, it’s starting to look and feel like fall. And the change of season brings with it a change in appetite. As we look around, we see apple and pumpkin spice flavored foodstuffs with more regularity. It’s time for serving up soups, comfort food, and crock-pot based meals.

Advanced M&V is on the Menu

Similarly, NEEP has cooked up its EM&V Fall Meeting and will be serving it up on October 3 in Hartford, Connecticut. We will be exploring the topic of “The Many Flavors of Advanced M&V”. Reservations (or, registrations, if you will) are now being accepted online, where our prix fixe menu (or finalized agenda) is posted online.

Taking a Look at the Recipe

While we all know that software and data to analyze building energy consumption are key ingredients for measurement and verification and impact evaluations, technological and energy industry developments are altering these main ingredients and spicing up the conversations about them. Advanced M&V refers to a combination of advanced technology – software with increased sophistication such as increased capacity for learning and the ability to process large amounts of data effectively – as well as the increased availability of large, more granular datasets delivered more close to real time. That said, not every single feature has to be present to still count as part of the Advanced M&V ‘new paradigm’ and discussion.

Amuse-bouche

We’ll be setting the stage on the eve of our event with a happy hour including networking. Please join us for a great conversation over light food and drinks, as well as a taste of what’s in store on October 3.

First Course

To whet the appetite, our day opens with a panel discussion that demonstrates many uses of and potential customers for M&V tools in the energy industry today. Some of the current business cases include supporting non-wires alternatives, demand response, ESCO audits, large commercial and industrial (C&I) facility analyses.

For a mid-morning pick-me-up, we’ll serve up a town meeting-style discussion of issues and opportunities associated with applying advanced M&V tools to program evaluation.

Main Entrée

After digesting all that material – and lunch – we will dig in to some experiments including presentations on pilot research (both actual and planned) in C&I and residential sectors, leaving room for discussion about what strategies would work best to learn what we need to know.

Dessert

And having saved room for dessert, leading experts serve up a good assortment of baked, well-vetted protocols, guidance that is in the works and likely headed to market, and consideration of what else needs to be cooked up – protocols and guidance that will keep the industry fully satisfied.

Deciding Where to Feast

If you’re undecided about where to focus your advanced M&V efforts, let NEEP’s fall meeting serve as a smorgasbord of delicacies to help you answer a few questions, including the following:

• Do you wonder if sophisticated software is useful without Advanced Metering Infrastructure? 
• Are there smart meters pumping out data that you are not making more use of?
• Does Advanced M&V hold promise for providing more insights or faster turnaround? Does it work in one sector better than another?
• While there are business cases to be had for program implementation, what is the appropriate role for M&V software to play in program evaluation?
• What criteria can be used to establish whether advanced M&V’s results are credible for describing, reporting, or evaluating building or program impacts? 

Join us on October 3. Sample everything. Focus on your favorite dishes. And use the experience to fix your own menu.