Auditing of Energy in Construction and Usage of Buildings

By Vozisov K.A.

The term “auditing of energy” came to Russia in early 1990s, and its widespread was due to development of such international programs as TACIS and U.S.A.I.D.

Auditing of energy is an enterprise analysis for evaluation of production energetic efficiency, search of the variants for minimizing costs of energy resources and options of their disposal.

At the present time the government is trying to stimulate economy growth and company’s efforts to cut expenses in many different ways. One of them has recently become a requirement on energy efficiency rules following.

Today energy study as a procedure of gathering and processing data on energy resources usage is necessary for all the companies, including those who use fuel and energy resources with cost exceeding 10 million rubles annually. Thus the first study shall be performed before 31.12.2012. Regular checks shall be made at least once in five-year period.

Newly constructed and (or) reconstructed (considering the dates of project documents after the energy auditing novelties enforcement) buildings, erections, premises, excluding temporary installments (with service life less than 2 years), additional buildings, houses with floor area less than 50 sq.m., shall comply with the energy efficiency requirements.

It is true that setting to work (including project documents) of buildings, erections, premises, that have been constructed, reconstructed, heavily repaired and not in compliance with energy efficiency requirements and not equipped with energy resources usage control devices, is not allowed. The last requirement is to be followed by all the owners of buildings, erections and premises used at the present time.

These proceedings are made by a developer via choosing optimum architectural, functional and technological, construction and designing plans and their proper execution during the construction, reconstruction and heavy repairs.

Energy checks can be performed only by people being members of self-regulating organizations in the sphere of energy research. Upon the results of energy check the performing officer shall issue an energy passport with the data discovered and pass it to the person who required this energy check. Energy passports of buildings, erections, premises set to work after construction, reconstruction and heavy repairs can be filled in on the basis of project documents. This passport is obligatory for all enterprises having energy utilities.

People, responsible for violation of the law on energy saving and energy efficiency upgrading, bear disciplinary, civil and administrative liability. Thus, the failure to follow energy efficiency regulations during designing, construction, reconstruction, heavy repairs of buildings, erections, premises and their equipment with energy resources usage control devices is charged with administrative fine amounting from twenty thousand to thirty thousand rubles for officials, from forty thousand to fifty thousand rubles for entrepreneurs without the status of a legal body, from five hundred thousand to six hundred thousand for legal bodies.

It is notable that systematic checks of energy saving requirements and energy efficiency upgrading may be held two or more times each three years with a general rule: one check in three-year period.

We should note that legislation made an effort to present the most detailed version of energy auditing by amending other laws. Surely the procedure is not stable yet that gives a lot of questions and problems in its turn.

The procedure of energy check is sure to be elaborate (generally it takes from two to 6 months) that increases the term of project documents preparation and negotiation, construction expenses (real estate reconstruction). It is still hard to single out matters of purely legal nature besides the technical (negotiable) issues, due to specific nature of the case as well as absence of precedents.

But we believe in declaring energy auditing advantages in terms of professional in-depth approach, starting with choosing qualified energy auditors and up to preparation and execution of the energy auditing regulations by companies’ staff. As of the data provided by independent experts, a company can cut its expenses up to ten percent with proper law execution.