The electric submetering market is taking off, thanks to the United States increasing their efforts to reduce their energy consumption. With global revenue from electric submeters expected to reach $2.5 billion by 2024, there is a huge opportunity for electrical contractors to take advantage of this enormous growth. Not only can contractors help their clients become more energy efficient, but they can also significantly grow their revenue with submetering services.
What Are Submeters?
Submeters are metering devices that help facility owners and managers to effectively manage their energy use. These monitoring tools are extremely useful in that they are able to monitor the electrical consumption of each individual energy user or the entire facility load. This allows facility owners and other end users to actively manage their energy use, and take steps to reduce their consumption, to save both energy and money.
Submeter Types
There are three main types of submeters: feed-through and current transformer (CT)-based (which are socket-type meters), and the electronic submeter (a non-socket device). The electronic submeter is considered to be the best in terms of flexibility, functionality, and cost. In addition, they are both easy and safe to install, making them appealing to electrical contractors who are looking to profit off of submetering.
Benefits of Electrical Submeters
As facility managers face mounting pressure to maintain energy-efficient buildings, the need for submeters has greatly increased. There are many benefits that electrical submeters can provide facility managers, such as the following:
Able to pinpoint energy consumption: If two tenants share a building, and one uses far more energy than the other, it isn’t fair for them to be charged for the same energy amount. Submeters are able to separate the energy usage of each tenant so that they are charged fairly. Additionally, submeters can monitor energy usage of specific items of equipment such as HVAC, lighting, or plug load.
Increases awareness: By simply being aware of how much energy they are using, end users can take the appropriate steps to reducing their energy consumption. This not only saves them money, but it will also help the environment.
Provides a benchmark for energy initiatives: Submetering is also a useful benchmarking tool that allows businesses to measure their performance and compare their energy consumption by day, week, month, or year. It also lets them identify areas that need improvement.
Optimizes equipment performance: In industrial applications, having real-time feedback on certain equipment performance is key to identifying equipment that is experiencing problems or quickly deteriorating. Submetering can identify these weak areas so that operators can take action.
What This Means for Electrical Contractors
As facilities search for new methods to meet their energy efficiency goals, electrical contractors can be the ones to supply them with the best solutions. Energy conservation efforts have significantly increased over the past few years, and commercial and industrial facilities are feeling the pressure to reduce their energy consumption in particular. Now is the best time for electrical contractors to jump in.
Prep for Greater Demand
Commercial and industrial facility owners will want to stay ahead of government mandates in order to reduce any potential downtime and will be looking for effective solutions to their applications. Electrical contractors will need to understand their client’s specific needs in order to recommend a solution to their application. To prepare for the rapidly increasing demand, contractors will want to have a reliable electrical distribution supplier that can get electrical parts to them as quick as possible. The faster the service, the more likely facility owners will be to recommend the contractor’s services.
Stay in the Know
With electrical submetering technology continuously improving, it will be more important for electrical contractors to stay on top of new developments in the submetering market. By expanding their services to include innovative energy auditing and monitoring tools, electrical contractors can make a hefty profit and get a better return on investment. Submeters are often combined with energy intelligence software, and electrical contractors will want to stay up to date on this technology as well.
Help Your Customers Save in Every Way
Electric submeters can benefit virtually any residential, commercial, or industrial application, and this fast-growing industry doesn’t seem to be slowing down. Electrical contractors can take advantage of the rising demand for electrical submetering devices by installing them for end users who require a cost-effective way to monitor their electricity usage.