THE ENERGY FUTURE OF EXISTING BUILDINGS IN BRUSSELS: BETWEEN PRESERVATION AND PERFORMANCE

the measures used are effective. We use a series of reporting tools, including the energy signature, that allow us to compare monthly consumption with daily temperatures and thus weather conditions.

THE ROLE OFTHE ENERGY MANAGERS

The key person in the PLAGE projects is the Energy Manager, who works in an energy team within the institution or company. One key implement element in implementing the plan and the actions carried out by the Energy Manger is concerted decision-making. It is essential that the Energy Manager does not carry the whole energy burden and responsibility for reducing consumption himself or herself, but that everyone in the institution or company is involved. The Energy Manager is the conductor of operations. He or she coordinates everyone who is involved - either directly or indirectly - with energy. He or she works with differently composed teams depending on the type of institution and the project duration: these include technicians, buildings departments and/ or communication departments of municipalities, players tasked with generating awareness, etc. In SISPs (public service real estate companies) for example, he or she works together with social assistants responsible for generating awareness among occupants, and also involves decision makers, managers, etc. in the process. In local councils this person will be the alderman; in an SISP, the director. The objective is to focus on transversal reports and to encourage everyone involved to be aware of the issues at stake. Subcontractors are also involved; for example, maintenance companies are encouraged to integrate the notion of energy performance into their contracts. There is also a requirement for exigency regarding maintenance contracts so that companies offer the most effective services. At the end of the programme carried out by Brussels Environment, the participating communes have retained all the Energy Managers.

MUNICIPAL AND VOLUNTARY SISP PLAGE PROJECTS

The municipal and voluntary PLAGE projects are interesting as they show the results obtained for buildings that have been identified as a priority among large groups of buildings (fig. 3). In these cases, the Energy Manager started off by targeting 10 - 12 priority buildings among all the municipal buildings, and these then underwent improvement plans for energy efficiency. The resulting reduction in consumption over the medium term spilled over to the whole of

Fig . 1

PLAGE projects are based on the continuous improvement process (© BE).

Fig . 2

The origins of the PLAGE projects date back to 2005, and are an initiative of Brussels Environment. The first pilot experiments with the municipalities were carried out in 2006. In all, 15 of the 19 municipalities took part in the experiment. The pilot projects were then rolled out in hospitals and more recently with the SISPs. After ten years of conclusive pilot tests, the programme will be made mandatory for private sector groups of buildings of more than 100,000m² and public sector groups of buildings of more than 50,000m² (© BE).

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