If your morning commute accounted for 40% of your gas consumption, it’s easy to see that you would probably be very interested in ways that you could reduce the amount of gas you consume by optimizing that route. According to the US Small Business Administration, the same percentage of the electricity used in buildings goes right toward the commercial HVAC system in NYC. While today’s HVAC systems are enormously efficient and highly controllable, there are still ways that you can improve how they function. Not all of them have to do with anything that involves even touching the commercial HVAC system itself.
What Is Solar Gain?
Solar gain is the temperature increase you get from the sun shining in your windows. Whenever you’re getting solar gain in your building, there is the inevitable boost in the amount of power that your HVAC system in NYC consumes. In layman’s terms – it simply has to work harder to get rid of that excess heat.
Installing blinds or using tint on your windows are both great ways to reduce the amount of solar game that you get during the day. In the winter, of course, you very well may want to open up those blinds and let that heat in – as it can actually reduce the amount of work your HVAC system has to do.
Check Your Lights
Another simple thing you can do is to look at the lighting system in your office or other commercial space. Incandescent lights produce a lot of heat. If you can switch those incandescent lights out with something more efficient, you’re likely to see some gains in the amount of money that you save on your commercial HVAC system energy bills. This does seem counter-intuitive, given that lights are not particularly large and one certainly doesn’t think of them as heating devices. However, and incandescent bulb actually puts out 98 W worth of heat for every 2W worth of light it puts out.
Seal Up the Windows
Energy efficient windows are very popular right now, and a lot of the reason for that is the fact that they save money. Unless you happen to have a historic property that you use for your commercial space, it’s a good idea to get your windows looked at.
No matter how hard your HVAC system in NYC is working, if there is hot or cold air coming in, it has to work that much harder to offset the effect.
During the winter and the summer, make sure you have your windows closed when you’re running the HVAC system. This helps to control the amount of air that has to be heated or cooled and, therefore, it can cut down on the amount of money that you pay to keep your HVAC system running.
Look Up
Your roof can actually play a significant role in how hot the building gets. One of the strategies that businesses are embracing is painting their roofs white. This helps to offset the heating effect of the sun and, of course, the less the sun heats up your building, the less work your HVAC system has to do and you end up saving money.
HVAC systems are capable of handling a lot of work and doing so very efficiently, provided they are properly maintained and provided that building owners are cognizant of the things that they’re doing to reduce efficiency. Ask your HVAC technician about some of the ways you might be able to help improve the efficiency of the system in your building. Everybody’s building is a little bit different, and your commercial HVAC company in NYC will be able to give you advice that will address the issues specific to your own building.