Survey finds more interest by companies in smart buildings

U.S. organizations are planning to increase investments in smart building controls and systems at a greater rate than more traditional energy efficiency measures, a new survey from Johnson Controls found.

Johnson Controls’ 2018 Energy Efficiency Indicator (EEI) survey revealed that 57 percent of organizations in the United States and 59 percent of global organizations plan to increase investment in energy efficiency in the next year.

Further, building controls improvements were cited as the most popular investment for the next 12 months with 68 percent of U.S. respondents planning to implement them. Also, building system integration jumped 23 percent increase over the previous year, the largest increase in the survey.

“Organizations are more interested than ever in leveraging energy efficiency, energy storage and distributed generation technologies to deliver smarter, safer and more sustainable buildings,” Clay Nesler, vice president of Global Sustainability at Johnson Controls, said. “U.S. organizations are especially bullish about the future impact of systems interoperability, systems integration, and cybersecurity technologies, leading all other countries.”

JCI found that organizations identify greenhouse gas footprint reduction, energy cost savings, energy security and enhanced reputation as key drivers in investment decisions.

Also, roughly one-third of U.S. and global organizations (32 percent and 33 percent, respectively) believe the ability to maintain critical operations during severe weather or extended power outages is vital when considering future energy and building infrastructure investments. Further about half of U.S. and global organizations (54 percent and 50 percent, respectively) are extremely or very likely to have one or more facilities able to operate off the grid in the next ten years. This marks a 10 percent increase from last year.

Additionally, the survey revealed a significant year-over-year increase in net zero energy goals, with 61 percent of U.S. organizations extremely or very likely to have one or more facilities that are nearly zero, net zero or positive energy/carbon in the next ten years. This is up 14 percent from the previous year.

The data is based on a survey of nearly 2,000 facility and energy management executives from 20 countries.