Reducing Energy Consumption during COVID-19

With a reduced campus population due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Northwestern’s Facilities Management and Direct Digital Controls (DDC) team leapt into action this past spring to identify measures to reduce energy consumption across both the Evanston and Chicago campuses. “With more students, faculty, and staff working from home for extended periods of time, we saw an opportunity to rethink how we operate our facilities from a building controls perspective,” explained Chief DDC Engineer, Mike Slimp. COVID-19 energy conservation measures ranged from shutting down HVAC systems in unoccupied buildings to maximizing system capabilities that utilize demand control ventilation to adjust ventilation rates based on usage of space.

In recent years, Northwestern has achieved significant improvements in energy efficiency, including a 24.9% reduction in building energy use intensity (EUI) from a 2010 baseline and achieving a 15.4% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions since 2012. EUI calculates total energy use per square foot and is a way to normalize consumption across an expanding campus footprint. While a portion of this improvement can be attributed to COVID-19, Northwestern’s EUI at the time of the shutdown was 173 kBtu/ft2 (or a 20% reduction from our 2010 baseline) putting Northwestern on target to surpass its EUI reduction goal irrespective of the pandemic shutdown. Additionally, Northwestern had several large, energy efficient facilities come online in 2019, which would explain—to a degree—this impressive EUI improvement. 

As more people return to campus, these energy conservation measures are evaluated and adjusted as needed. Reducing energy consumption remains a priority on campus and Facilities Management continues to explore opportunities to improve energy performance in both existing and new buildings.