Optimum Energy Builds Innovation Portfolio with New Patent for Whole-Campus HVAC Optimization

Seattle – Optimum Energy continues to advance smart building technology and scale up energy efficiency potential with a new patent issued this month, which adds to the HVAC specialist’s technology advantage in optimizing building environmental systems holistically at every level, from tiny valves to entire campuses. 

The newly awarded patent covers Optimum Energy’s methodology for achieving maximum energy efficiency across a campus by coordinating multiple chiller plants in a single, combined system. The company has developed a unique logic for assessing efficiency in real time and staging chillers across a campus so that the system maintains preferred temperatures and pressures using the least possible amount of energy.

“Our methodology treats the campus holistically. The focus is on the best efficiency across the campus, not just in individual chiller plants,” said Ian Dempster, senior director of product innovation. “If the campus load goes down, for example, our software may decide to drop a chiller or pump less water—it makes decisions based on whole-system performance, so we’re always optimizing for the sweet spot.”

The technology is already at work in university and pharmaceutical campuses, contributing to savings of $500,000 to $1 million or more per  customer annually.

Culture of innovation bears fruit
The patent, Systems and Methods for Reducing Energy Consumption of a Chilled Water Distribution System (patent no. US10415869), is Optimum Energy’s 17th in a succession of patents for advanced technology. Two were awarded last year, one that harnesses the Internet of Things for a system that connects smart valves for communicating to a controller to enable better efficiency decisions, and another that brings the power of machine learning to chiller plant control, enabling systems to always operate at top efficiency.

Optimum Energy, which has a pipeline of 11 patent applications pending, has developed a culture of innovation that encourages and rewards continual technological advances.

“Our focus is not just on the technology we have today, but on the technology that will take us into tomorrow,” said Larry Stapleton, president of Optimum Energy. “This is part of our lifeblood as a company. It’s increasingly obvious that optimizing our energy use is essential, and we have to move beyond today’s best practices. We’re focused on continually setting a new, higher standard for energy optimization.”

About Optimum Energy
Optimum Energy enables campuses, hospitals, pharmaceutical plants, high-tech manufacturing facilities, data centers and other commercial buildings to cut energy costs and meet sustainability goals by optimizing HVAC systems, the largest consumer of energy in buildings. The company’s optimization software and cloud-based OptiCx® platform reduce an HVAC system’s energy usage and resulting costs by up to 50 percent. The technology also reduces water use in chiller plants, tracks and reports on savings, provides detailed insights into building system operations, and efficiently scales across entire building portfolios. Optimum Energy technology has enabled current customers to save over 1.2 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity, reduce carbon emissions by over 770,000 metric tons and save over 250 million gallons of water