News
ENERGY EFFICIENCY WILL
BECOME A MUST FOR BUILDINGS
By Benjamin Brits
Owners of certain buildings in South Africa have but a few months left to obtain and prominently display an Energy
Performance Certificate ( EPC ). This regulation , gazetted in December of 2020 , applies to non-residential buildings with a net floor area of at least 2000m 2 in the private sector ( including schools , office blocks , malls , theatres , entertainment venues , etc ) and 1000m 2 for government buildings . The building EPC must be displayed at the building entrance and target at least a D-rating .
The deadline for compliance is 7 December 2022 . Consequences of neglect include the risk of a fine of R5-million , five years ’ imprisonment , or both . The regulation also comes with penalties for any facility in the scope with a lower than “ A-rating ”; however the primary objective for obtaining an EPC at this point in time is to make building owners aware of their energy consumption and encourage more ongoing energy efficiency . Certification will need to be renewed every five years .
Now as many facility owners or managers will be investigating every opportunity to discover efficiency to meet targeted ratings as well as mitigate the effects of the continuously increasing electricity rates in South Africa , one area that can provide notable , and in some cases extremely significant improvement , would be the aspects related to HVACR maintenance , in particular the process of plant and component cleaning .
In a prior issue of the RACA Journal , a new and revolutionary cleaning process was introduced driven by O3 Chemicals who have developed specific solutions for coil cleaning . Historically , coil cleaning has been an intensive manual process that takes up a lot of time but more importantly huge amounts of resources . It would be common to waste thousands of litres of water – and although this too has historically been left for the facility owner to “ foot the bill ”, such volumes of resources are now also being reviewed for wasteful tasks as water is undergoing a fast-pace increase as well , but more importantly owners and managers are fare more sensitive towards their environmental impact .
Another misconception of facility owners / managers , particularly those that make use of various filters in their system is that these filters stop all particulate . Now , although filtration is a necessisity in nearly all HVACR applications in South Africa , they simply cannot eliminate all particulate and the complications of replacement with HEPA filtration , or alike , is simply impractical . This leads to the fact that coils particularly in an HVACR system unavoidably gather dust , grime , mold and bacteria , and
All photos by O3 Chemicals
depending on the frequency of use may lose efficiency within a couple of months . Loss of efficiency translates directly to energy savings , but furthermore additional stress upon system components equates to premature failure too .
Several trials and demonstrations have been undertaken by O3 chemicals in partnership with industry roleplayers in applying their strategy and solutions that have seen impressive results . The simplicity of the process using specially sourced oil-free compressors , pre-measured chemicals , and as little as a couple of litres of water ( depending on the unit ) results in split unit cleaning taking around 25 minutes and a large air handling unit taking a mere 1.5 hours to clean . Also owing to the silent compressor type , cleaning can be carried out during regular office hours without interruption to operations .
“ The solution opens up the door for not only speed of service but adding value to the industry and its clients . Maintenance professionals can now perform three to four times as many
An example of a coil cleaned directly after the traditional cleaning method used in industry .
A before and after example .
www . refrigerationandaircon . co . za RACA Journal I September 2022 13