Comfort is costly!
Energy consumption by HVAC equipment can account for 40% of total energy requirements in office buildings and as much as 80% in clean rooms. Where customer comfort or staff productivity are the highest priority, so is the demand for efficient temperature control. These scenarios range from school rooms to outlet malls, call centers to insurance agencies, church buildings to casinos. The temperature change of as little as 5 degrees can change your experience from pleasant to unbearable. These demands push air conditioning systems to their maximum delivery rates and cause many building owners to install oversized units to compensate for future losses in efficiency. This results in wasted money, materials, man-hours and energy.
What can be done?
One of the easiest and lowest priced investments to reduce your expenses at the time of installation and throughout the life of your air handling unit, is the installation of high efficiency air filters, like the Electro Breeze electronic air cleaners from Electro-Breeze-Supply.com. These air cleaners utilize a replaceable pad that is electronically charged to make the filter 97% efficient down to 0.3 microns. This reduces your need for coil cleaning from yearly to as little as every 4 years, depending on your environment. The Electro Breeze high efficiency air cleaners also improve your indoor air quality, which is being enjoyed by many casinos and schools.
How much can I expect to save?
According to the Energy Efficiency Guide for Asia, just 0.8mm of build-up on the coil surfaces can result in a 35% increase in energy usage. That means that a $520 monthly energy bill is increased by $280 to produce the same temperature control as when the coils were clean. In other words, your bill will be almost $800 per month when they get dirty! As a commercial building owner you already know this, that is why you pay for those yearly coil cleanings, right?
Coil cleaning?!?
When you pay for a coil cleaning, the technician is only cleaning “all he can”, not all that is present. According to the November issue of Contracting Business Magazine, one pound of contaminants (mold, dust, crud) still remained in a 25 sq ft coil after it had been professionally cleaned. Residue from the “clean” coils was being circulated throughout the building and landing on the occupant’s desks! That internal build-up is costing you energy in the form of increased pressure drop. Increased pressure drop means that it takes more energy to move the same amount of air through the air handler.
Change the filters!
The purpose of the filters in your air handler are to keep dust off of the internal components. Any service technician will tell you there is a fair amount of bypass on cardboard bound air filters. This results in dust getting around the filters and clinging to the moist air conditioner coils. The other condition that most air handling purchasers don’t take into account is the microscopic dust that blows right through pleated filters. Almost all pleated filters are rated at less than 20% efficiency for particles smaller than 1 micron and those microscopic particles are what make up the coil build-up, not to mention a breeding ground for mold and bacteria.
In residential application, the use of the Electro Breeze air cleaners has virtually eliminated the need for A-coil cleaning. It is not wishful thinking to conclude that the application of Electro Breeze electronic air cleaners in a commercial air handler will reduce the cost of coil cleaning from $350 every year to $350 every four years or more!
What is the cost?
To emphasize the cost savings of installing the Electro Breeze air cleaners, we look at a 10 ton unit which is typically installed for an average office area. Keep in mind that oversize air handler units are installed with the assumption that their efficiency will degrade, so for this example we will assume that a 10 ton unit is appropriately sized for its area. The cost of installation of the Electro Breeze air cleaners for a filter bank with four 20x25x2 filters would be less than $1,500. The replacement cost of the filter pads is the same, or less, than the cost of normal pleated filters so they will not be part of the equation. Energy savings will be about $1,470 if we consider that the energy efficiency degrades in a straight line over a 12 month period ($70 per month increase in energy cost due to efficiency degradation in the second quarter, $140 increase in the third quarter and $280 increase in the last quarter = $1,470 in added cost for energy). Add the savings of not calling a service tech to clean the coils ($350) and you have paid for the addition of the Electro Breeze air cleaners in less than 1 year!
Indoor Air Quality
One of the greatest benefits of the Electro Breeze air cleaners is the improved indoor air quality. Your staff will be more productive and your customers will stay longer. This leads to more profits by paying for less sick time for staff and the possibility of increased sales with your customers spending more time in your store!
John Hendrickson writes to help commercial building owners/operators reduce their operating costs and increase their bottom line. Find more information about John and the Electro Breeze brand products at www.electro-breeze-supply.com.
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