Betting on a better Building Management System

After an ambi­tious façade project at 201 E. 79th St. was completed, the 1960s co-op share­holders wanted to figure out how to save some money.

The co-op board had elected to redo the building’s exte­rior with a porce­lain tile-clad rain­screen system, a huge under­taking to the tune of around $30 million. In its wake, the building’s resi­dents were dealing with increased monthly main­te­nance fees ande wanted to cut costs elsewhere.

Then Anthony Maldonado, the building manager at 201 E 79th St., attended a meeting with other building managers where he heard of a tech­nology that might tip the scales, while also contributing to the building’s energy effi­ciency: A building manage­ment system (BMS). 

A BMS is a computer-based program that moni­tors and manages the energy oper­a­tions essen­tial to the building’s func­tion. The BMS uses sensors installed on systems that control heating and cooling, including cooling towers, heating valves, and the building’s chiller, among others. By collecting and storing that data, the BMS is able to track how elec­tricity is used in a building, and make smart choices about energy use.

In 2022, Parity, a Canada-based HVAC-opti­miza­tion busi­ness that works with large resi­den­tial build­ings and hotels, installed a BMS at 201 E. 79th St. to auto­mate power use and temper­a­tures by connecting to the building’s HVAC system. The cost for instal­la­tion was over $60,000, according to Parity. 

Parity’s BMS keeps a smart, watchful eye on 201 E. 79th St.’s oper­a­tions. Its soft­ware uses algo­rithms to remotely monitor the building’s oper­a­tions, and can catch poten­tial prob­lems early. If it detects abnormal energy use some­where in the building, the BMS sends alerts to the building manager, who can still make manual temper­a­ture adjust­ments by turning a valve for one of the heating or cooling systems. 

A more watchful eye helps the overall building avoid excess elec­tricity use during peak energy hours, which occur when more customers are drawing energy from the grid, and the utility company charges more for power — not unlike surge pricing on ride-sharing apps. The BMS works to keep the building at a comfort­able temper­a­ture and also lowers energy costs by reducing unnec­es­sary energy consumption. 

“People that aren’t in the industry don’t really appre­ciate how much energy is consumed to heat, venti­late, cool, light, just operate these big build­ings,” said James Hannah, the managing director of Parity. 

Parity esti­mated that the new system saved the building more than $124,000 from August 2022 to January 2024. The company also esti­mated that it would reduce its carbon emis­sions by about 146 tons in the first year — equiv­a­lent to the emis­sions created by 34 gas-powered cars in a year.

“Because we’re doing this remote-control automa­tion, we’re able to provide a guar­antee,” Hannah said. ​“We tend to outper­form the guar­antee by a pretty good amount.”